


Shipping

by Omano



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Tattoo Parlor, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Daddy Michael, Domestic Fluff, F/M, Family Drama, Fluff and Angst, Implied Relationships, Jealous Lucifer, Kid Castiel, Kid Dean Winchester, Kid Fic, M/M, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Protective Michael, Slow Build, Tattoo Artist Lucifer, Tattooed Michael, Tattoos, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-09-16
Updated: 2015-06-22
Packaged: 2018-02-17 16:17:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 30,451
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2315735
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Omano/pseuds/Omano
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“You are a dick, Michael. I don’t want anything for my birthday.”<br/>“Pity. Maybe Gabriel will do my tattoo instead.”<br/>Did he—? No, he must have heard it wrong. Was that the headphone still blaring in his ear? No, it was lying forgotten on his desk. What? What did Michael just—?<br/>“Say that again!” Lucifer demanded breathlessly.<br/>“I want you,” Michael pronounced on his smooth arrogant-dick voice, “to make me a tattoo.”</p><p>Michifer Tattooartist!AU where Lucifer is totally thrilled to finally ink Michael up.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I finally gave in to the pressure and post it here as well. I hope you'll like it! All kudos and comments are appreciated :)

 

There was a time when a man could take a joke and could even laugh at it for a few hours, but there was also a point where a man would just simply flip out because he hadn’t slept for like 36 hours and the clock on the wall his annoying little brother brought back from India was getting at his last nerve with its baboon-like shriek four times an hour.

Lucifer was having like the most important day of his life and he couldn’t afford fucking this up! It was troublesome enough that he had spent the previous night sketching like crazy and tossing in bed, but who could blame him? He was finally inking Michael up!

It was even better than his wildest wet-dream come true. Okay, maybe not, but it was really, _really_ close.

Ever since he made his first tattoo he wanted to put one on Michael. He had impossibly perfect skin, the most desirable canvas an artist can crave but no matter how many years Lucifer had spent trying to convince him, Michael stood firm. Even as kids Michael always came up with excuses like “We just bathed, we shouldn’t get dirty again.” Mr. Goody-two-shoes was just no fun even at the age of nine. Lucifer and Gabriel just shrugged and soon they were a shrieking mess and all three of them were covered in colourful markers. As a result Mr. Shurley rolled his eyes and sent them back to scrub it off with a scowl. Michael didn’t talk to them for _days_.

Nowadays however, Michael sooner or later reached his final argument that he wasn’t supposed to mark up the skin he was created in by God, and usually at this point Lucifer flipped out and they would fight that Lucifer’s neighbours started praying for the Apocalypse to end quickly.

After that Michael would usually go ahead of schedule to visit his parents before he had to go back to his unit. Michael’s leaves were always too short when they fought (and didn’t they always?) and it would usually leave Lucifer with a bitter taste at the back of his tongue. He could talk the stars off the sky, why couldn’t he succeed with Michael of all people?

The baboon shrieked its final cackle marking the passing of 10 o’clock, and Lucifer slammed his hands on the counter. He was going to tear the damn clock off the wall and strangle Gabriel with its tail!

“Someone had a rough night,” Crowley sneered with his irritating British, Scottish, Lucifer could care less at this very moment, accent.

Luckily for the mole in human disguise the bell over the door chimed just in time to stop Lucifer from smiting him on the spot.

Michael was always on time. 

His face lit up from under his skin, a beautiful golden glow whenever he saw Lucifer after a long time. Michael was mean when it came to dispensing full-on smiles, the whole curl of the lip, wrinkles and creases that made his eyes glimmer and maybe even flash some teeth, but he could smile just as nice with arranging the soft shadows on his face.

It sucked to be an artist at times like these.

“Morning,” Michael greeted – pristine and tight, but _awake_ , and Lucifer hated him for that.

The feeling dissipated quickly though, when he caught glance of the cup-to-go with a ribbon wrapped around its middle in Michael’s hand.

“Is that my birthday present?” Lucifer inquired and soon he was all very deep in Michael’s personal space.

Michael had his way of getting him coffee just the way he _loved_ it but could never-ever order for himself. No matter where he was at the moment, which part of this goddamn huge country. There might be a suspicion of Michael operating with shady forces.

“It’s my birthday today,” Michael told him and pushed the warm cup to Lucifer’s chest. “Your present is that I let you ink me up.”

“You know,” Lucifer mused, and his voice was already smoother with the hot beverage of liquified life, “birthday boys usually get something. Not _give_.”

Michael cocked an unimpressed eyebrow.

“I could always retract if that’s how we are.”

“Please don’t!” Gabriel pushed his way past Lucifer to give a one-armed hug to his adopted big brother. “Lucy’s been going crazy over your tattoo’s design. I would pay you a fortune not to see him in tears over it.”

“Crazy?”

“You have no idea!”

“You are being an inconvenience, Gabriel.”

Gabriel only chuckled at his brother’s irritation and one arm still around Michael’s shoulder (which, otherwise, was a rather funny sight) he stage whispered, “You remember how he got when that teacher he had a crush on gave him a C for his painting.”

The shadows on Michael’s face morphed into amusement, the edge of his lips twitching.

“Oh, that was a nightmare.”

“Multiple it by three and add in the whole next week after in the mix and you’d get what we had to go through from the moment you stepped out of the parlour.”

“Fuck you Gabe. You know when I will make you another tattoo!”

“You poor little thing!”

The younger bitch-slapped Michael in the arm.

“I can’t believe you still take his side in everything!”

“He will hold the needles after all.”

Had Lucifer mentioned that Michael could be a sweet-talker as well when he tried real hard?

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> — Or How Michael strolled into the parlour and turned Lucifer’s world upside down with one sentence.

 

The day before Lucifer was busy drawing up a tattoo he actually found pretty interesting when suddenly Gabriel snapped up his head like a hound catching scent of prey. His little brother dropped his pencil, quickly pushed Ruby out of the way and threw the door open.

“I’ll be damned!” Gabriel hollered.

That in itself wouldn’t have been enough for Lucifer to leave his design (a willow tree just morphing into a woman who was either about to swallow a man or give birth to him from her wooden womb) but the low, barely more than an annoyed huff of breath chuckle was enough for him to tear the plug of his headphones out of his ear and turn around.

In the doorway Gabriel was busy hugging the shit out of Michael.

“Well, well. Is the End of Days looming over us?” Lucifer drawled leaning against the main counter – he had mastered containing his burst of excitement whenever Michael returned to them; he could never know for sure after all if the elder had forgiven him after their latest quarrel.

“Am I bad news now?” Michael gave it back, now free from Gabriel’s clingy hug.

“Since Satan is still in one piece, I’d venture to state we were a bit overdramatic,” Crowley stated.

Michael sent a questioning look to Lucifer who only shrugged in reply. It had been a going on joke for a while and he just decided to roll with it.

“So, what’s the excuse of the visit?” Gabriel asked. “If it’s about your birthday, I swear I have no plans—“

“Just as you had nothing last year.” Ruby remarked in passing.

“I swear on my candy-stash!”

“And you’d just watch them bicker?” Lucifer murmured. He watched with a smirk as Ruby took her escape, still taunting Gabriel about his brilliant party without the birthday-boy and his brother following her gesticulating wildly to prove his point. Michael followed the two with an amused frown of his own.

“The only fights I have to break up when I’m on leave are between you and Gabriel. The rest will eventually unravel itself.”

Lucifer hummed. “We weren’t expecting you. I remember you saying something about celebrating with Castiel?”

“That was my promise, yes.”

“Shame on you. I don’t see you for what? Half a year, and then you just drop by to say hi.”

“Not just for that.”

There was something, a little glint of mischief, a smug smile hiding in the depth of Michael’s eyes. It was a rare sight and it never ceased to make Lucifer feel flushed under the collar.

“If you finally decided to hand in your wish list for presents, you are past hope. You’ll get nothing.”

“What if I’m here to propose your gift, then?”

Had Lucifer ever shared his theory of Michael and his smirks of mass destruction being the only reason he was still in the army?

“You are a dick, Michael. I don’t want anything.”

“Pity. Maybe Gabriel will do my tattoo instead.”

Did he—? No, he must have heard it wrong. Was that the headphone still blaring in his ear? No, it was lying forgotten on his desk. What? What did Michael just—?

“Say that again!” Lucifer demanded breathlessly.

He only realized how much he had forgotten about controlling his body when Michael leaned against the other side of the counter and they were so _close_. All Lucifer could see were Michael’s gleaming grey-green eyes and perky smirk. The air between them quivered with the blond’s harsh breathing. His own pupils were blown, his pulse thundered in his ear, he was so focused on Michael he could care less for the sudden silence that fell over the parlour.

“I want you,” Michael pronounced on his smooth arrogant-dick voice, “to make me a tattoo.”

 

Now, the way Gabriel had pictured Lucifer’s state after Michael left (which was totally inaccurate in wording, because he had never had a crush on their art teacher in fifth grade) was nothing compared to the way he really felt after Michael’s dramatic announcement. There was a devastated blow, what the A-bomb on Hiroshima or Nagasaki must have felt like, yet Lucifer managed rather well not to freak out then and there.

He acted rather professional. Which, apparently no one really had expected from him as he caught from the corner of his eyes as Gabriel begrudgingly handed over some bills to Ruby.

They were still very, very close with Michael. If Lucifer tilted his head a bit to the side he wouldn’t even have to lean that much in and they would be brush lips and kiss. That in itself was a thrilling thought on a normal day, but then the blond had to restrain another kind of tremble of anticipation.

“A tattoo?” Lucifer asked on a husky drawl.

“A tattoo.” Michael confirmed.

Just as Lucifer’s mouth curled into a sharp and lewd smirk someone cleared their throat, loud and pointed. Both men’s head turned to the side in disturbing sync. (That never ceased to creep the shit out of Gabriel, as he usually complained, because if they just snapped it would have been acceptable, but the fuckers’ tiny headtilt and deathly glare-squint were also eerily mirrored and that was creepy as fuck.)

“We agreed that you’d keep the sexual tension for when you can fuck it out!” Gabriel complained loudly.

“You are confusing reality with porn again, Gabe,” Lucifer gave it back smooth and easy. Then he turned back to Michael. That tingling heat curling in his stomach was something that demanded to be felt. “So, what do you have in mind?”

“A ship.”

“Anything with a little more detail?”

If Lucifer expected him to pull out some kind of folded reference picture from his backpocket he was sorely mistaken. Michael only pushed himself off the counter to pull the (sinfully tight) T-shirt up to his neck and point at his side.

“A sailboat. Here.”

There had been countless times Lucifer had seen Michael shirtless. He had seen him chubby, then skinny during their growth-spurt, then he started ogling when Michael joined the swimteam in high school, and would have never missed a competition for sorely artistic reasons. He had also seen the tight skin over Michael’s well-defined muscles both pale and sun-kissed, and he had counted all the scars on his shoulder and hip, he probably knew them better than the man who wore them as reminders of war. It wasn’t even as if they had never touched – because summer heat had never deterred them from throwing punches and shoving each other into the pool to continue wrestling in there.

The new prospect however, was laced thickly with artistic curiosity – a thrill non-the-less, and rather similar to that undertone of his mind that purred darkly during fights that he searched full-body contact because he wanted to commit every inch of Michael’s skin to his memory. That was edged with desire, hot and painful, but nothing as whole-consuming as it was like then in the tattoo-parlour.

“What size?” He leaned over to touch the indicated right side, pressing teasing fingertips into the delves of muscle, ran down next to the abs carefully, checking for new scars, barely touching to the sharp cut of Michael’s pelvis.

“Like your Falling Angel.”

“Falling or Fallen?”

“Your Paradise Lost Lucifer. Falling.”

Lucifer furrowed his brows a bit. “That’s going to hurt here. Ribs are a sensitive area.”

Michael met his eyes cool and unmoved. He didn’t even grace Lucifer with an answer.

“You’re surprisingly tight-lipped,” he mused as he went on with the assessment. “Have I gotten an email with pages of text describing exactly what brand of ship you want from which year and the rest?”

“No, there is no such thing.”

At that Lucifer had to do a double-take. What?

“So…?”

“So.”

“Damn it Michael, what the Hell?”

The shadow over Michael’s face sharpened.

“I want you to make me a tattoo. I want it to be a sailboat with stars pointing right here.” Lucifer’s gaze zeroed in on the small white point that was still faintly visible where Michael pressed his finger over his heart. “That’s it.”

“You know, usually I need more. Like, reason behind the desired design. Some answers to _why_ …”

Michael fixed his eyes on Lucifer’s face. He nearly looked disappointed.

“Do you really need them?”

“Well, it would make the designing a lot easier and since you are such a godawful control freak…”

“Lucifer, you know me better than anyone.”

“You still could keep a damn secret for like four years, so maybe it’s not that well in the end.”

That was a bit harsh, uncalled for and definitely unprofessional, and Lucifer surprised even himself that he still hadn’t gotten over it, but it was now out there. Lucifer stared at Michael with flashing eyes and tightly clenched jaw. The easy air of teasing banter was swept away by a freezing gust of wind.

Sensing the change in tone, after another long moment of staring contest and wordless fighting Michael’s frown eased up. He reached out and carded his fingers through Lucifer’s messy hair as a peace offering. With a scoff Lucifer pulled back; but the spell of tension was at least broken.

“I trust you can work out my reasons even despite that.”

“I feel like you didn’t want to give much thought to this tattoo and now just expect me to fuck up so that you can back out.” Lucifer groaned annoyed.

“Which part of _I trust you_ did fly by your head?”

“Pardon me, did you say something?”

That robbed Michael of a small chuckle.

“I gave it a lot of thought.”

Lucifer was only sure he had given even more.

 

They agreed on some more minor details in peace, because his colleagues knew better than to advance them when they were huddled over a piece of paper, foreheads just a hair’s width away from touching, and exchanging breaths of whispers.

In the end Michael announced that he had a Skype call due in half an hour so he had to take his leave. Though he still found time to sink his hand in Lucifer’s hair again, carefully tilt his head and brush a kiss to Lucifer’s forehead.

The truth was Lucifer could melt on the spot after such tender act of affection – it was so gentle, all the care of a whole universe with its steadily thrumming power, and it was warm as the glow of fire in the cool summer night dotted with sparks; fondness that Lucifer knew was saved specifically for him. Yet, he had to mask up the childish joy, the tears that could wet his eyes whenever he thought of Michael’s lips on his skin, wondering if he’d ever receive it again, whether Michael will come back to him next time. Instead, he pulled up a shield of ice, a cold layer of sarcasm.

He grimaced in disgust and turned his head away – Michael’s fingers sliding through the way too long strands above his ear.

“Your touchy-feely side is still awkward,” he told Michael with kind condescension in his tone.

“It might be just yours,” Michael murmured still from very close. Then with the soft shadow of a smile on his face he left the parlour.

The moment Michael disappeared out of sight Lucifer swept everything off his desk. The willow-tree and her victim/baby lay forgotten crumpled on the floor until Meg came in that afternoon to pick it up and call Lucifer out on his crap, and as he paid her absolutely no heed she took over the job (bless her black heart, even if he only recognized this two or three days after).

He had a lot of thinking to do after all.

 


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The part where Lucifer barely gets the lineart done and they already are at each other’s necks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just as a sidenote here I mention some religious themes here, some that are really promblematic, but for the record I'm a Christian myself and I mean no harm or ill for anyone. I just found it fitting for the characters.

 

The day grew better and better by each minute ticking by.

Lucifer downed half of his coffee and blessed Michael on the most blasphemous way possible just for good measure (and also because Michael’s eyes hardening to the colour of steel was such a turn-on, and he would be damned if he let one opportunity slip by without stashing the picture for future lonely nights). It was nearly worth it, but Michael still managed to keep the shadow of the devastating look when Lucifer eventually showed him the lineart of the tattoo that robbed him of his beauty sleep.

Michael looked it over – eyes sharp like a hawk’s for the tiniest detail.

That half minute was the longest, even longer than the frustrating hours of the night of overthinking and overanalyzing everything he knew about Michael – who, for that matter had absolutely nothing to do with freaking ships! In this one, though, Lucifer’s palms started sweating and there was even an annoying tremor shaking his fingers.

Eventually, Michael nodded his agreement with his lips pressed into a tight line, but it was enough for Lucifer to feel a burst of pride in his chest.

As he smoothed the stencil on Michael’s side Lucifer wondered with some sly warmth tingling at the back of his neck if Michael had any shirts that actually fitted him. Today he wore another one that had to be peeled off his torso like a second layer of skin. Not that he complained.

In front of the mirror Michael hummed his satisfaction and before Lucifer had a chance to check for his face he already lay on his back waiting for Lucifer to start working.

Only when he drew the first line and realized that now there really was no going back, _it was finally happening!_ could he start breathing again.

Excitement cruised in his bloodstream hot and tingly but the buzz of his tattoo machine calmed him enough not to look like a punk drawing his first unsteady lines. He would decide later if it’s a good thing that he had about an hour while Gabriel kept Michael entertained until his own patron arrived. Lucifer might have had troubles building up complete sentences at this point.

Everything was perfect. They made small talk, they joked, Michael took the pain well and shared one or two of his stories about the hopeless bunch he started training at boot camp, and Lucifer made good progress with the tattoo. It was great until Lucifer’s eyes zeroed in on a paler line of skin, just over the place where he had dreamt up a white star.

Lucifer had to stop the machine before he did something really stupid.

With definitely less tenderness than it required he smeared some ointment on the sensitive inked-up skin. Then he returned to add some minor details to the ship on Michael’s ribs – making sure they hurt.

He chewed on the cold-heat that gathered in his throat, playing roller coaster and trying to burn a way out of his stomach.

“Will you ever respect my fucking life-choices?” Lucifer snapped cold and low as he put his tattoo machine to the side when he was finished with the lineart.

“What do you mean?” Michael gave it back, reserved and just as cold.

“That!” The word nearly caught in his throat on the fury.

Michael frowned in confusion before he tentatively reached a hand to his breastbone, eyes carefully trained on Lucifer.

“Yes, that!” Lucifer spat.

You could pinpoint the exact tenth of a second when Michael realized what Lucifer was talking about. His face closed off and that snobbish air settled around him that he didn’t even have to push himself up on his elbows or anything he felt so superior, high and mighty in his skin. A fingertip followed the white outline of the cross below his collarbones.

“I took my necklace off.”

Lucifer scoffed. “Why bother? There is just no way I could miss it.”

“Guys, really?” Ruby tried to cut in but she retreated quickly after Lucifer’s eyes flashed at her.

The temperature in the shop dropped drastically.

“I got sunburnt. Are you really going to hold this against me—?”

“I don’t care! Stop being an ass about rubbing your fucking religion in my face!”

“I will if you stop being an ass about accepting my religion!”

Such arguments weren’t rare between them. But still, this was the kind of quarrel that usually preceded Michael’s leave for another half a year and they just met up again and this was the best fucking day of Lucifer’s life, so why the hell—

He needed a break. Right now.

Lucifer ripped his plastic gloves off and, somehow refraining from throwing them into Michael’s pretty glower-y face, he stomped out of the parlour. With jerky movements it took him two tries to pry his pack of cigarettes out of his pocket. If Michael kept up being such an ass and Lucifer so jumpy he would go through the whole pack that day.

.

He was taking the last drags from his second cigarette when the door opened next to him. Lucifer just begrudgingly flicked the stub off a pulled another cancer-stick out of the pack.

From the corner of his eye he could see the endless planes of golden skin as Michael leaned against the wall.

“Just for your information,” Michael started, frustration vibrated in his low tone, “it’s the mark of your necklace. The sword, remember?”

Yes, Lucifer remembered hunting down the golden necklace and working his ass off so that he could give a real Michael-sword to his best friend/adopted brother/first real crush/ bastard who made his life impossible/whatever label Michael wore at the moment he turned sixteen. He also remembered the certainty that Michael had thrown it away when he joined the army.

So no, it didn’t matter. Michael was a dirty liar who only wanted to prove that Lucifer is the Idiot Asshole and he is the Perfect Son.

Michael sighed.

“I just left the congregation, so it’s a bit of a touchy subject for me as well.”

Lucifer squinted at him with narrowed eyes.

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Thought it might satisfy you. You’ve been nagging me with it for years.”

“Depends on your reasoning behind it.”

For a while silence settled over them, only cars passing by and the distinct chatter from the pedestrians hurrying past them to avoid the dark cloud that still hadn’t lifted from Lucifer.

Michael sighed again. Really, did it come with hitting 35? If so Lucifer dreaded his next year. Damn, they were getting old.

Lucifer glanced over. It was awful how difficult it was to stay angry with Michael when he had that deep, bitter look in his eyes. He truly looked miserable on his own terrifying way.

“Castiel was in hospital again.” Michael admitted on a carefully low, hollow voice.

“I know. Mary Winchester told me,” Lucifer admitted. Way to start the school year. Then he reluctantly added, “Sorry I wasn’t there.”

Michael shook his head. Lucifer guessed his shoulders didn’t sag only because he was much prouder than that and the constant big brother act he picked up during their childhood just didn’t let him show weakness.

“It’s not like I called you either,” Michael murmured bitterly. “And he was out before you could have made it so…” He waved his hand as if trying to shoo away the guilt or whatever deepened the furrow over his brows, but as soon as he realized the helplessness of the motion he quickly shoved the affronting hand in his pocket.

Silently, and carefully aware of his stoic features Lucifer offered his meanwhile newly lit third cigarette.

Surprisingly, Michael took it immediately.

He choked on his first drag. It was probably the only thing Michael would never learn how to do with his usual grace. He just inhaled with the aggravation of a drowning man spluttering for a lifeline, which totally made him a suicidal drowning man, but who was Lucifer to judge Michael for his methods of killing himself? At least this one took time.

Michael handed the cigarette back, blinked away the tears from the sting of the smoke and on a calmer, raspy voice said,

“In the hospital, khrmm… Some members of the congregation sometimes go to visit if another member is sick. Showing support.”

Yeah, Lucifer had experienced such support the last time as well.

“So they came and…Well, they haven’t given up on their theory that Castiel is sick so often because of me. That seeing him suffer is my punishment for… Because I’m living a life that is unholy in front of God.”

Michael’s silent scoff covered up for the sound of Lucifer’s gritted teeth.

“I had enough. I love Castiel and I love you. I can decide this much.”

“It’s none of their business. Either way it’s not like we are living together.”

“Being unmarried and accepting comfort from a man who wears the name of the Adversary seems enough to condemn me.”

“So what? Now you’re ready to burn in Hell?” Lucifer asked incredulously.

“Apparently.” The edge of the dry uptilt of Michael’s smirk was soothing though. Not exactly what Lucifer had maybe hoped for but he had to settle for small things. That bunch of hypocrites had been poisonous for Michael; it was only high time he realized it himself.

“But you still teach the brat how to pray before bed, huh?”

Michael redirected his eyes to the cracks of the pavement. It was his way of stepping down from a challenge, showing he meant no harm even if his following words could be like salt rubbed into a wound.

“I haven’t fallen like you.”

Lucifer only smirked at that. _Not yet_ , he was about to say but he caught the words still in his throat.

That was the difference between them. Lucifer had gotten mad at the god behind it all, the one who made it possible for blindfold, hypocrite old bastards to condemn him for who he loved. While Michael was relentless, maybe childishly loyal to his faith that Lucifer sometimes adored sometimes pitied, but it made him turn angry at the people instead. How much the blond wished he could have seen Michael tearing a new one to the heads of his ex-congregation for their idiocy.

Lucifer allowed himself a lingering look and then laughed, sharp and short not even whole-hearted. He had to let out his own fair share of bitterness and cold anger, and mock Michael a bit so that they could get the topic behind them for sure. They had had enough of theological debate for the day.

“Are you done with your smoke break, or should I come back another time?” Michael asked, head held high again, now recovered from his quiet confession.

Lucifer took the last drag from his cigarette.

“Nah, I’m good,” he puffed out. “Don’t you need anything?”

“Only you to grow up.”

That only earned Michael a condescending smirk. Lucifer crunched the stub with his heel and motioned at the door.

“Let’s get the tattoo done. I wouldn’t take it on me to keep you away from dear Castiel for another day.”

“One day you’ll regret the tone you talk about him.”

“Haven’t I already?”

 


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Michael has an awesome relationship with Lucifer’s friends.

 

Getting back into the easy mood that Lucifer had been hoping for the whole day was difficult and needed some outside help. A conciliator. That usually would fall on Gabriel, or maybe Balthazar, but the latter had been on his day off for three days and Lucifer’s little brother was rather busy flirting with the girl whose thigh he was inking up.

See when Lucifer will listen to his hissy fit about him ‘flirting’ with Michael every time he’s near.

He was not trying to pick Michael up. He was tormenting Gabriel. Very different.

So what if he liked to wrap his arm around Michael’s waist and feel the muscle shift in his hip when Lucifer whispered something into his ear with a wicked smile? Michael would only lean into his touch after cutting a mischievous glance at Gabriel just to make sure he was watching. He would promptly turn his head so that when he answered their cheeks brushed. Then, of course, he would complain that Lucifer had left stubble-burn on his neck, but as far as he said that with a chuckle simmering in his chest it was totally worth it.

It was fun to watch how Gabriel took it worst that no matter how he tried he couldn’t catch Michael and Lucifer actually together. Not in Truth or Dare, not in Never Have I Ever, no kind of game would serve his holy mission of revealing their relationship. Mainly, because there was nothing to be revealed. Gabriel, the stubborn little shit he was though, only refused to accept that.

He claimed, such amount of sexual tension could not be for no reason and they were both closer to 40 so why the fuck hadn’t they gotten over their goddamn blind asses? That was Gabriel.

Who also knew better than getting involved with their quarrels.

Meg, on the other hand, bless her darkened soul, took the role of conciliator on herself.

Which, after a second thought, probably wasn’t such a good idea since she and Michael didn’t like each other that much.

Actually, Michael didn’t like most of Lucifer’s friends. Not that it wasn’t mutual, but still. While Lucifer was willing to make small talk with either Raphael or even with Naomi, it took fifteen years until the name of Gadreel could come up without Michael bursting a nerve.

But Meg talking on her low drawl distracted Michael enough and Lucifer, too, could concentrate on two different things finally that didn’t include how they always fought and how good make-up sex could feel like afterwards instead of a half-a-month of cold-shoulder treatment.

“And how is tattooing going for you, Meg?”

Everyone in the shop could tell that Michael was as interested as a fish in gardening, but he was brought up with manners thank you very much.

“All right,” Meg answered with a shrug. And it totally proved that an actual dialogue between the two was still close to impossible.

“If you’re being an asshole I’ll hand her the gun to finish your ship.” Lucifer warned. From the corner of his view he saw the appalled and still somehow unimpressed look Michael sent him, and also Meg’s vibrant red smirk.

“I thought she was just your apprentice.”

“Well, this _just_ apprentice has done her first big tattoo.”

“Yeah, it’s pretty cool,” Lucifer stopped his machine, rolled back his chair and pulled up the left leg of his jeans.

For the first glance it was just a mess of black and red, but as Michael took a better look it proved to be a hellhound flanking Lucifer’s calf, in a manner that was probably more cat than dog, but the vicious yet adoring look it sent up at its master was pretty well spot on.

“The strokes were a bit uneven at first,” Lucifer said turning his leg for Michael to have a better look. “But I only wanted to smite her once in the process.”

At his side Meg was beaming hellish darkness in pride.

“I can see the resemblance,” Michael noted dryly.

Meg glared daggers at him. It was a scenery to watch her expression morph from rejoicing over someone’s death to I’ll-kill-you-with-a-teaspoon in a matter of a second.

“How does it make up with the rest of the angels on your body?”

Lucifer was about to point out that he had like a dozen of _fallen_ angels tattooed all over, but he thought better of it.

“I have serious troubles with shoelaces on this foot,” he gave it back with some exaggerated irritation in his voice. “But only St. Michael on my right arm has issues. The rest accepted the new pet marvellously.”

“I was under the impression that hellish designs were for your minions.”

“And where do you think we’ve learnt those, sweetheart?” Meg cut in with a venomous smile.

Lucifer really should remember this when Meg asked him the next time when she could do her next big tattoo. Even if her hands weren’t steady all the time just yet if she could make up with Michael’s jibes, hell, she deserved the promotion!

“Now I wish you were there at the Hell Breaks Loose event,” Meg told Michael. “It would have been a sight to see even the stick shoved up your ass get baffled.”

Yeah, Meg wasn’t great fan of Michael either. They were all right. Most of the time. Michael hadn’t tried to gut her yet after all.

But just to be sure Lucifer started working on Michael’s ribs. A little distraction wouldn’t hurt. _That_ much.

“Hell Breaks Loose?”

“Appropriate title, let me tell you. An exhibition opening...”

And Meg went into explaining how some curator-turned punk had always been a great fan of Lucifer’s works, and how she had been obsessing over him for years, but how she could only get to her (Meg’s) master (that’s the way Michael usually referred to Lucifer and Meg’s relationship) through getting involved with Abbadon (another of Lucifer’s friend Michael had a special dark place in his heart for). At this point Michael was internally rolling his eyes. Then his expression melted into some unique mixture of indignation and exaggerated fondness that still darkened his eyes as Meg told him how Lucifer decided to turn up at the opening, scrolling through her phone for illustration.

“Lucifer had painted these burnt marks all over his face, as if the skin started peeling off, all 3D. It looked all really badass, especially with the bloodied hands. He still had paint under his nail-beds for days. All make up for kicks. How did you put it? You had a day off?”

“An afternoon.”

“You looked all dangerous male beauty. Satan walking on Earth. You should wear more leather.”

“Leather?”

Lucifer grinned wide. Most probably he was the only one to hear out the tension in Michael’s carefully measured I’m-only-humouring-you-peasant tone. Or maybe it was just the abs under his fingertips, but Michael was definitely interested in Lucifer’s wardrobe.

“Black leather pants, shiny boots, white jacket rolled up to the elbows and deep V-cut shirt. You’d die to see that, huh?”

“I wouldn’t go that far.”

“Then how about an I’m sorry for calling me a minion?”

“I’d rather die, thank you.”

“That could be arranged.”

With a disappointed click of her tongue Meg slipped her phone back into her pocket and stood.

“I’ll go and see if Gabriel has anything.”

Each of Lucifer’s friends loved Michael. And all of them would like him better six feet under.

 


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Michael’s Mom is a shipper.   
> Enough said.

 

“Is there any particular reason why you try to engrave that ship into my ribs?”

“Noooo,” Lucifer drawled innocently.

He just started to ponder if Michael had some serious problem with his pain-receptors, because there was just no way his fingers would be otherwise so gentle in the mess of his hair when he worked on the fine lines of the pennant just on the bone when he had to wonder no more about the nature of  the touch. In way of a flinch Michael gripped at the longer strands and pulled until Lucifer had to crane his neck to stare in the deathly smile and the dark glint of Michael’s grey-green eyes.

“Do you think you’ve tortured me enough by now, Lucifer?” Michael asked softly.

Lucifer quenched down a tremor. Honey-sweet warmth coiled in his throat while his lips curled into a smirk.

“Tattoos hurt, my dear angel.”

“I only wonder what you’re going to do when you finished all the details there.”

“Oh, no need to worry. I’m full of ideas.”

“Would you keep your kinky foreplay for when it’s only the two of you?” Meg drawled, her heels clicking on the floor. “Gabe’s run out of bleach.”

“He wants to set us up all the time,” Lucifer shrugged, Michael’s warm fingertips still burning at his scalp. “Baby bro, you should finally make up your mind!”

“Fuck you!” was Gabriel’s answer with a poisonous grin for emphasis.

“Anyway,” Meg threw her hair over her demon-covered shoulder, “about that appointment of your death…”

Michael glanced up at her with a strange glint in his eyes. His hand slipped away from Lucifer’s hair and the younger nearly felt a pang of disappointment.

“I’m not willing to die for anything.” He squinted at the phone Meg teasingly dangled over his head.

Oh, she really should know better.

“Trust me, sugar, this one’s to die for.”

“We’ll see,” Michael murmured, and before she could blink twice he snatched the phone out of her red-clawed fingers.

After a long minute of flicking through the (probably too dark and blurry) pictures on Gabriel’s bright green phone, some squirming, and Lucifer was pretty positive he should let out the breath he had been holding so far if he didn’t want to go purple Michael handed back the phone. Glancing up at the smugly grinning she-devil he said, “You can arrange a date with Castiel tonight.”

“Was it that good?” Lucifer asked.

“More like I remember you swear up and down you’ll never ever wear leather again unless it’s a jacket.”

“That was in high school. Ages ago.”

“Three years after,” Always so specific, he could tell the exact date and hour but then Lucifer would feel obliged to knock that smile off his face. “First time we talked after I got enrolled.”

“That was a rather quick conversation.”

“Yet, what do I draw on you?”

Lucifer laughed out. Short, but with all the relief that was about to burst his chest.

“There is no fucking way you’d put a tattoo machine on my skin!”

The edge of Michael’s smile sharpened. The challenge was on. He’d have to bribe Gabriel and really, everyone in the parlour not to let Michael close to the machines. Crowley would be a hard case, but really. Michael’s artistic skills were below of a three-year-old’s.

.

Just in case, Lucifer refrained from carving the symbol on the sail into Michael’s ribs and that finally seemed to have settled the tension.

“Have you visited your parents yet?”

Michael hummed in thought. He probably knew that he couldn’t really give a good answer to that. He either would get called out on putting Lucifer third, not second, but _third_ , or on being a Hypocrite Good Son.

Or maybe it was just that the shading hurt, but not yet enough to make him wince.

“I will next weekend,” he answered eventually. “I called them, though.”

“I bet only if they would watch out for Cas while you get your hot-ass tattoo done here,” Lucifer smirked.

“They don’t know about the tattoo.”

“Oh?”

“No one does.”

“You and your secrets, Michael. One day they’ll get you in trouble.”

When Michael didn’t snap back at him Lucifer first just chuckled to himself, satisfied. Then, when there was no change in the subject or any other kind of irritated noise he grew suspicious. He glanced up curiously.

Michael was busy avoiding his eyes. There was a soft tint of dawn rising on the chiselled cheekbones.

“Ooh, I want to hear this story,” Lucifer grinned and moved his tattoo-gun to a less sensitive area of Michael’s side.

“I have the most embarrassing parents ever.”

“You think I don’t know? I lived with them for eight years, too.”

“Not like that.” Michael sighed deeply. “Dad is tackling one of his writer’s blocks again—“

“I thought he was writing again. Last time I called, he was fairly tipsy and typing gibberish on his rock of ages computer.”

“When was that?”

Lucifer wrinkled his nose in thought. “A month ago maybe?”

“Yes, he is still writing that _Glory of the Fallen_? I don’t even know how he titled it.”

“Thought it was more to do with _Glory of Heaven_?”

The sound Michael made was pained like of a shot lion’s.

“Yes. That is it,” he moaned in agony. “I thought he gave up that idea.”

“Apparently he didn’t,” Lucifer said, gloating. But, truth be told he was also convinced, just as everyone else that Chuck had given up writing about angels long before he could make up the first parts of a plot. Last Christmas when the old man (who, for the record, could be mistaken for forty just as easily as sixty) approached the only religious member of the family with some questions about angel and Heavenly canon Michael answered in such clipped tone and levelled his father with such a glare that would even deter Gabriel from eating the chocolate cake in front of him.

“What is that one you mixed it up with? Some sexy novel?”

Michael groaned and flung his arm over his face. “You could say that.”

“Spit it out Michael, or I swear I’ll draw all the planks of this damn ship.”

Lucifer could clearly hear the eye-roll before Michael launched into the intro of the story.

Chuck Shurley had never been that kind of writer to whom the words and ideas came easily. He had books that were brilliant and some that were below terrible. And then he had writer’s blocks, which paired up with his problems with drinking resulted in him spending a lot of time at a bar, because Becky just always managed to find his carefully stashed liquors. And bartenders were always that type of guys who could just point out the obvious in one’s life. As far as Lucifer could make out the slurred gibberish rambling of his step-father over the buzz of his tattoo-gun so was the case with Chuck. Rufus just pointed out that Chuck had three kids with the name of three of the archangels, his eldest is best friends with the fourth so why not try something new and give the Supernatural a try? (Michael also confirmed this part of the story now.)

(Lucifer only knew about this beforehand because of all the Enochian and fallen angels that made up like 90% of his tattoos, and so was the second best source of research after Michael, who plain out refused to encourage a novel on such holy topic as Heaven, and God, and Angels. Whenever in doubt ask the black sheep of the family.)

“… and Mom is really supportive,” Michael went on as if he was testifying before his inevitable death sentence, “because she has been nagging him for years.”

“Obviously.”

“And ever since she only has that afternoon job at that video rental, she got into this _thing_ …”

“Fanfiction, , right?” Michael nodded, still hidden beneath his arm. “But she’s been into that for a while.”

 “No, well, it _is_. It’s… She calls it _shipping_.”

“Ok-kay?”

“It’s… it’s when you ship, imagine two characters _together_.”

“Together-together? Come on, that’s not new. “As in want-them-to-fuck-really-bad involved?”

“Always so tactful. Romantically together.”

“I still don’t see your problem.” Lucifer shrugged. “Like, for a while you were convinced I turned out gay because of the bedtime stories she used to make up.” By now Michael got the memo that Lucifer was bisexual, but they had that awful episode in their relationship when the elder really threw that reasoning at his head.

He was a tad bit disappointed. It was well-known that Becky was a bit crazy and lived and died for romantic and steaming hot stuff. That was nothing new. “I mean, I’m still fairly sure that you must have been adopted, but all the official papers confirm that for you to be born—“

“My problem is,” Michael cut in sharply, “that my Mom. Is shipping. Something she dubbed _Michifer_.”

During that whole sentence Lucifer tried his best to swallow down the laughter that was ready to bubble up from his throat at the palpable agony in Michael’s words. Yet, at the last one he spat as an insult his eyes glinted at Lucifer, “If you dare to ask what that is, I’m calling you an idiot.”

Now that was one challenge. While it wasn’t the worst name to be called Michael had this way of pronouncing _idiot_ that made Lucifer grit his teeth and be torn between clawing that arrogant and condescending down-curve of Michael’s mouth  and wanting to run to the end of the world and curl up under a rock and cry.

Disguised as a well-deserved stretch to pop his spine back in its place Lucifer leaned back in his chair.

Chuck was writing about angels. Which, Becky definitely saw still in the process, because otherwise Michael would have no Daddy to call. Becky could fly over the handle when she got excited, and she sure as hell got ecstatic, because she had new material for writing her own stuff (frankly, more often than not she was a better writer than Chuck, she was just awful at making up characters of her own)—

And now she was _shipping_ hot winged men named after them—

Michael immediately picked up the moment the pieces clicked together in Lucifer’s head. With the evil smile it really wasn’t that hard.

“And she read it up to me!” Michael sounded like an honest to god teenager whose mother just showed his baby photos to his girlfriend. “And you know her, I couldn’t just hung up on her. I’m scarred for life!”

“What, did she really get you through all the secrets of gay sex?”

Michael flushed scarlet behind his arm and down to his collar.

“You’d want to know, huh?”

Lucifer chuckled and leant on the table, his arm lined up with Michael’s warm side.

“Actually, I do,” he murmured, and carefully laid his head on the other’s chest minding the irritated, sensitive skin. “All the tiny, dirty details.”

“Go to Hell,” Michael grumbled and tried to shove Lucifer off. He was so mortified by reciting the memory that he eventually answered instead of just glaring daggers at the blond. Oh, life was occasionally really sweet.

“So, time to confess, Michael. Is this your reasoning behind the ship?”

“Christ, no!”

“It totally is! I got you blaspheme, it totally is!”

The exact same second Michael threw his arm off his face to grab at Lucifer again a phone’s camera went off just over their heads. Gabriel squealed with glee.

“I’m so gonna be Becky’s favourite!”

“Gabriel!”

The youngest knew when to run. When Michael sobered up, eyes flashing with the destructive power of a lightning storm, and his voice quieted back to something cutting with only two spots burning red on his cheeks you knew you were dead in half a minute.

Gabriel only grinned and a blink later he was out of the parlour.

“What’s gotten into your brother?” Michael glowered back at Lucifer.

“Oh, so he is just my brother now?” but eventually he deflated and waved a dismissive hand. “Her cookies went from disastrous to a piece of Heaven last Christmas. Or at least for our chubby little angel. But. Is our angelic couple your Mom’s admiral ship or what?”

“I can’t believe you,” Michael frowned.

Lucifer wiggled his eyebrows suggestively.

“No. It isn’t.”

Yeah, Lucifer totally believed him.

“What then?” Lucifer pouted.

“You can guess it without new information. Use your brain.”

“It’s not fair to lie, Michael. I’ll catch you lying and then you’ll regret it dearly.”

“I’ll admit if you hit it spot on.”

There was a really good remark about how his aim was perfect and there was no way Michael could do anything but scream in that case, but what was the point when Gabriel was away and Michael was already annoyed by his own mother? Where was the fun in that?

 


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Surprises, surprises. Or at least sussposedly surprises :)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so actually this is the whole reason I started writing the fic . Sounds strange a bit, but it is my favourite and the dearest of the whole thing. So, I hope it’s not that terrible ^^;

 

“Hey, Mikey, do you still want to murder me?”

“Probably.”

“Come on, I need some big bro advice.”

Michael regarded Gabriel with a long, eerie look – which, just by the awkward angle he had to crane his neck was truly remarkable.

“Don’t you have Lucifer at hand all the time?”

“Yes, thank you. Just carry on without acknowledging me.”

“Stop being a drama queen, Lucy. You’re no use with your longest relationship being one and a half months.”

Lucifer scoffed.

For a second he was about to correct Gabriel on the number, but then he remembered that they most probably didn’t have the same definition for relationships, and so the on and off two years he had spent with Gadreel didn’t count. Or maybe it was actually longer. Hard to count when one was stuck in jail for a few fleeting months.

“And so you rather ask Mr. Drill Sergeant over here?”

Gabriel promptly ignored him.

“So, is there any future Mrs. Shurley within sight?”

“I’m busy, Gabriel and you know it. I don’t have time for dating, not to mention that long—“

“And you’re totally and hopelessly in love with the greatest asshole of the universe, I know.” He waved it off.

Michael’s eyes flashed. Funny how easily Gabriel forgot about the sword hanging over his head when Michael was stretched out under his brother’s tattoo machine.

“Have you ever considered proposing to anyone?”

“Whatever this is about?”

“Come on,” Gabriel pressed on with a sly grin that somehow went hand in hand with the excited innocent gleam in his eyes. The lights in the shop were weird. “You knocked up a girl and you, honourable soldier boy never even thought about marrying her?”

“I’d be dead if I ever tried. Wait, do you want to propose to Kali?”

“Before _she_ puts a ring on him,” Lucifer cut in with a sneer. “Why have you never even mentioned me that?”

“Because while you are my brother and I love you, you are a great big bag of dicks.”

Lucifer scoffed. “I’m not about to have another nephew am I?”

“Niece.”

“Seriously?!”

“God, no! Don’t get your panties in a twist.” Gabriel leaned back in his chair, grinning wide at Lucifer’s shock. “True, though. I’m looking for ideas for proposal.”

“Michael’s no use for you. He’s way too straight to the point guy without a romantic bone. He’d do the sterile, get on one knee and pop the question type. Maybe with a fancy restaurant tops.”

“You know me so well.”

He just flashed a devious grin at Michael with some snide remark, but it quickly melted into a dry smirk at the dark look on Michael’s face. Lucifer’d go as far as to call it bitter, even.

“God! Why was I damned with brothers like you?!” Gabriel threw his hands up in the air. “I’m only glad Chuck and Becky aren’t those kind to preach you’ll have to wait ‘till your bros get married. Wait in line! Bah. Doomsday’ll come sooner than the two of you getting married.”

“Why the drama?”

“Because you’re hopelessly single as I mentioned before, and Luce—“

“He has a girlfriend.”

“Do I?”

“You had one yesterday.”

“Oh?” He’d really have to have words with Gabriel about keeping his Facebook profile updated without his consent. “It’s over, I’m happily single.”

“That’s exactly what I’m talking about!” Gabriel threw up his hands again and grumbling about unmarried-married couples he went to search out Ruby. Demon or not, a woman’s idea might be better on the subject.

“Lucifer.”

Michael’s eyes were piercing, daring him to lie.

Lucifer took away and stopped the buzz of the needle to look Michael in the eye.

“When will you get it into your thick skull that there are relationships that just come and go?”

“They are not supposed to be like that.”

“Says the one who has a kid from a relationship he’s never had.”

“ _Still_.”

Leave it up to Michael not to give Lucifer a point when he clearly had one, he rolled his eyes.

.

He remembered clearly the time Michael dropped the bomb of him being a father.

They had just started their tattoo parlour in the sunny California and Michael’s leave coincided with it too, so it was a night for celebration. They were just waiting for Gabriel’s girlfriend to arrive after already a few rounds when Ash, their shop-manager then, proposed the idea of never-have-I-ever, and even despite Meg’s disgusted glower Gabriel, risking the state he would find his needles and paints in the next day backed up the idea.

So it was never-have-I-ever until Kali arrived.

It went all right.

Gabriel still pouted as a petulant chubby kid he was when he just couldn’t catch Lucifer and Michael being together, and Meg drank shot after shot that just ensured Lucifer and everyone else who had ever doubted that the woman had liver of iron or was simply a demon in human disguise. So they all in all had a jolly-good time until they needed a break waiting for Ruby to return with the next round. Then Ash, already a bit drunk to creative thinking, threw in:

“Never… have I… ugh, eva’ had a kid.”

The round of chuckles was broken though, and eerie silence fell over the table as Michael reached into his pocket.

He fished out his phone, unlocked the screen and threw it in the middle of a table with such elegance that should be illegal after all the shots he had had. With the very same movement he reached for the last shot, and raised it for a lazy cheer before he threw it back.

“What?” Ash’s incredulous cry broke the silence.

Michael cleared his throat then nodded calmly at his phone. “His name is Castiel. He’s turning four this August.”

Five hands shot to grab at the phone to take a look at Michael’s wallpaper.

When the phone reached Gabriel Lucifer caught a glance of the two boys on the screen, the bigger one with blond hair and green eyes over freckled round cheeks, the smaller one, sitting on a tiny bike in front of the other had dark tousled hair, chubby cheeks and blindingly blue eyes.

The exact replica of Michael when he was around that age.

Lucifer felt something cold bloom in his guts, and burning up the alcohol that once made everything nicely fuzzy and warm.

Everyone was cooing over the picture.

“I would have never taken you for a family guy, Mikey,” Gabriel grinned a bit sharper after the shock.

“Both of them are yours?” Ruby asked, peering at the attraction over Meg’s shoulder.

“No. Only the one with blue eyes.”

“Haven’t seen a ring on your finger, Michael,” Balthazar moved to the next most important topic, and Lucifer froze. He felt surprisingly cold-headed when he only wanted to set fire to the whole world.

“Yeah, where was our wedding-invitation?” Gabriel complained.

It wasn’t as if they were together. They have never really been, officially or otherwise, it was just fun to watch how everyone felt uncomfortable around them, unsure if they should ask for girlfriends/boyfriends when they didn’t acknowledge each other’s personal space so openly.

But _this_?

Lucifer, too, had partners all the time, for one night or for one or two weeks, Michael never even raised an eyebrow, and he was fine with Michael’s occasional hook-ups. They weren’t _together_ ; they made absolutely no promises of commitment (how ridiculous would that be?). But a _kid_? That was over the line!

“Are you sure it’s not just a bitch who wants to get to you with this _brat_?”

Lucky, they had collected the empty glasses in the middle of the table, because had he any in front of him, Lucifer would have smashed them face-first.

He tended to make the deadly mistake of forgetting that Michael was a soldier and he could kill him ten kind of different ways in a blink of an eye, or at least make sure he broke both his nose and arm.

Usually, when Michael wanted to demonstrate his dominance over him, he was cautious to leave Lucifer’s right arm out of the show. But not this time.

Lucifer had struck a very sensitive nerve.

“This _brat_ is my _son_.” Michael hissed into Lucifer’s ear and twisted even further on his arm behind his back. Lucifer could barely breathe pressed into the table and shoulder screaming in pain. “I won’t allow you talk of him like that.”

Lucifer felt the pressure ease just a little bit on his back, and he was only let up enough to take a breath and realize that yes, his nose was bleeding, but he was more concerned with what was to follow because he knew this move. Now he was going to be smashed into the table until either the wood or his skull gave way—

Thank goodness, their friends knew Michael’s moves as well, and could read the murder in his flashing eyes quick enough for Balthazar to grab Michael from behind and with Meg’s help drag the man off the blond, while Gabriel pulled Lucifer away before he could turn on Michael.

Gabriel dragged his brother into the bathroom to clean the blood off his face and just for good measure push his head under cold water. Just to stave off the further fighting.

When they returned, Michael was still in murderous mood that probably wouldn’t lift until he got his knuckles bruised. Preferably on Lucifer’s face. So Balthazar proposed that they should let off some steam in pool (it would be darts in any other case, but sharp objects in Michael’s hand seemed a bit too risky at the moment) – the Brit looped an arm around their General to lead him over to the pool tables to scare the kids away.

.

Even after they were thrown out on their drunk asses Lucifer couldn’t shut his mouth.

He didn’t even remember what he said, but next morning his face was a huge bruise, and he had the worst headache of his life. Which only got worse when he opened his eyes on the beach. The sun wanted to burn his eyes out, his clothes were scratchy with sand, but compared to his mouth even the beach was an oasis. Michael on his side woke just as grumpy, nursing a black eye of his own, complaining about Lucifer’s smoking habits that just happened to swallow him up all the same whenever he was so upset.

Yet, after they crawled into the shade of the nearby dock, in morose silence they smoked Lucifer’s last cigarette cursing each other under their breaths.

Lucifer remembered vaguely that Michael explained last night how he got to be the single father of baby Castiel, but he couldn’t really recall it. To be honest he didn’t want to touch the topic of Michael’s kid with a ten-foot pole.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And now I kindly ask, if not beg You, Dear Reader to let me know what you think :)


	7. Chapter 7

 

After Michael announced his newly discovered single-parenthood (still and always very tight-lipped about the exact details, so murderous when Lucifer prodded with his malicious remarks, and immediately closing up into his soldier-self whenever Gabriel or Balthazar inquired about his friend, Naomi) a lot of things had changed between him and Lucifer. And funny enough, still nothing was really different.

They still had their weeks of strained and soul-wrenching silences. Just as their early morning/late night talks with heartfelt pauses when they just listened to the other breathe on the other end. Heart thumping in their throats, though calm in its fluttering, content yet worried if the other had fallen asleep. Or if they were alone with half closed eyes, musing into the soft silhouettes of the night until they could swear they caught the lazy curl of a smile, the even rise and fall of a chest, or the last glint of the day in dark-green or blue eyes.

There were nights that started out as the most intimate, like those Lucifer had never shared with anyone, regardless if they had gotten past third base or not, just for the call to end abruptly, and in his neighbours knocking on the wall for him to cool the fuck down and stop screaming!

The next Christmas had been a disaster.

Admittedly it wasn’t half a year spent engulfed in the most frustrating silence ever, since just a day before the family gathering Michael called Lucifer ranting about how his head was about to burst and how he was going to bite his tongue in half and swallow both parts if he had to soothe Castiel one more time about his missing bee-plushie.

(Lucifer was having one of his rare good days in that period of five months and so the call spared him a lame excuse as to why he hadn’t gotten his shit and pride together and bought the brat some gifts for Christmas. He was in big enough trouble that he missed to show up for Thanksgiving.)

Lucifer was on the straight way to lung-cancer, if Becky didn’t beat it out of him first with a wooden spoon.

There was just something awfully motherly in that woman, a sixth sense that went over-drive whenever Lucifer tried to sneak away for a smoke. And damn, did he need it more than usual!

First face-to-face introduction with Castiel (it was a miracle the boy could pronounce his own name, God, what was Michael thinking when he named the poor little thing?). It went well. If one didn’t count that Lucifer felt an awkwardly strong urge to strangle the kid as he tried to roll his name around in his mouth. It was just… well, disgusting.

Eventually he just did what seemed the wisest concerning survival. Sitting with Kali and glaring at everyone when not smoking in the backyard.

Yeah, Kali was still scary on her own Destroyer kind of way, but at least she was the least swooned by Castiel wobbling around on his tiny feet and playing Godzilla among the wooden blocks he got for Christmas.

It was only Michael’s glare that stopped Uncle Gabe ( _seriously?_ ) to encourage Castiel in his future baseball career, though.

Seriously, Chuck wasn’t on the carpet playing with the bunch because even after months of theoretical preparation he was still new to this Grandpa-in-training thing. He was just awkward at new things, really.

“Have you managed to settle in finally?” Chuck asked, eyes fixed on his glass of cognac.

The frown over his brows and the glances he had been sneaking at his son told Lucifer clear as day he was calculating if in one moment when Michael checked on his family cooing on the ground he could change to his beloved whiskey.

“Yeah, we’re fine now,” Michael answered. From the corner of his eyes he could clearly see what Chuck was up to. But he didn’t mention it. It was Christmas. “The neighbours help a lot, and I only got called once or twice from kindergarten.”

“A little trouble maker?”

“Not as bad as Gabriel and Lucifer were in their time, thank God,” Michael said, a bit absentminded and even with a soft shadow of a smile. “We had to re-learn sharing.”

Lucifer rolled his eyes. Seriously? What the Hell was this little not-full-human made of to make Michael speak like those sap moms?

“He inherited that from you,” Chuck honest-to-god giggled. _Giggled_. A grown-up old man! Someone kill Lucifer. Now. Please.

(In that moment Kali levelled him with a look that actually suggested that he had uttered that wish aloud and she was more than willing to be his executioner.)

“No, it wasn’t that bad. It’s just… it seems to run in the family that certain people manage to bring the worst out of us,” Michael sent a meaningful look at Lucifer, who just glared back stubbornly. “After the rough start Castiel and Dean are best friends now. Inseparable in fact.”

Despite the (exceptionally) good dinner some malice started burning in Lucifer as Michael shared small stories of Castiel’s adventures in kindergarten.

At first he thought it was only the sudden amount of sweetness he absentmindedly devoured rotting away his insides, but when a hiss just bounced off the fence of his teeth it became clear it was more of his old-time companion, jealousy making everything clammy and cold. Even despite that the green-eyed monster curled in a vicious grip around his chest just started simmering at the end. As it burnt the brimstone smelling smoke puffed and pushed at the inside of his ribcage till the verge of pain. Maliciously it started crawling up his throat, inch by inch, invited by each sunny word that rolled off Michael’s lips and had nothing to do with Lucifer.

“… after that some of the children, you know how they are, picked at him for having only one parent, and. Well, let’s say it was a long week.”

Chuck nodded along dutifully (he had a lot of experience in sitting and brainstorming in front of the principal’s office thanks to all three of his sons), Kali looked totally unimpressed, maybe a tad bit more murderous, and with the background noise of Gabriel imitating the screams of poor citizens and Castiel’s high-pitched giggles something snapped in Lucifer.

The firecrackers went off.

As one final attempt to save the Christmas spirit Lucifer peeled the packet of cigarettes out of his pocket and tapped a cancer stick out from it, but Becky was so bewitched by her grandson that she totally disregarded her Lucifer-is-about-to-kill-himself senses, which only made matters worse.

“What says she isn’t just piling all the trouble and shit at you?” he asked, gently with a wicked smile.

The air froze over the table.

Michael’s face grew as expressive as a piece of stone trundled about in the river-bed.

“Excuse me?” In his eyes, though, the embers lit up fiery red.

“Some bitches just want an excuse to complain and stay home playing mom and daddy—“

“Lucifer!” Chuck tried to warn him, but his voice was so soft it was no challenge to talk over.

“—and when they get bored they take advantage of idiots like you Michael. You should pass the kid back to her before you go bankrupt with all the fucking expanses. See, when she turns up after you’d paid for every—“

Suddenly the words stuck in Lucifer’s throat as his vision was filled with Michael’s eyes burning with that terrifying dark shade of rage. His ears were ringing with the other’s hands slammed down on the table. Cutlery danced to the ground, glasses clinked and toppled over from the force as Michael launched forward and grabbed the front of Lucifer’s shirt.

“I’d rather Naomi was a selfish bitch,” he hissed into the dead silence, “than explaining death to a child, ever again.”

“Michael!”

“Remember, when you came crying to me, so broken about how to explain it to Gabe? How dare you—?”

“Michael!”

Becky’s firm voice finally snapped Michael out of his anger-rant.

He flashed his eyes around at the people looking at him with different shades of fear and worry glinting in their eyes, all of them with different but all the same everlasting memories of the terrors of Michael’s temper.

Normally, Michael would scoff and snarl at Lucifer before he stomped off to cool down, or lie in ambush for the second they could put their frustration into a fist-fight or something more physical than just words. But not now.

Not when little Castiel hid away in Gabriel’s arms, plushie clutched and squeezed almost flat between their chests. The boy didn’t make a sound. He wasn’t wailing with terror or confusion, only stared up at his father with huge blue eyes flooded by tears. It was worse than the screaming and the panic. And Michael knew it.

Lucifer didn’t see Michael’s face morph into something entirely different, something he had never seen before. He missed the wince, as if he had stepped into a glass shard, just barely more than a needle, but he cannot care to get it out, so he would just put up the façade and carry on. It was something soft among the hard and deeply sad edges as Michael knelt down to gently take one of Castiel’s tiny hands in his, talking softly until he could coax his son out of Gabriel’s embrace and lift the boy up on his hip.

That was the first time Lucifer got ignored. Thoroughly and ultimately _ignored_ by the only person he would never ever want to look through him.

.

He spent his days between Christmas and New Year getting wasted. He was so successful that he slept through the whole craze and so he started the New Year with a monstrous hangover hunched over the toilet bowl retching his guts and lungs up.

As far as he was concerned, only one day passed from that awful Christmas-dinner and him waking up on the tiles.

Not so surprisingly his apartment was a mess. Some things broken, he’d either had to eat from paper plates or… No. He seriously needed a round of shopping. And also he had to smooth out things with his neighbours and charm them out of their pants to take back those accusations.

Lucifer also got that flagrant palm-sized spot inked up on the inside of his right knee with a morphed, fallen angel, half of whose face was melting off in the shadows.

It hurt like hell, but it still couldn’t compare to the way Michael turned his back at him back home.

 


	8. Chapter 8

 

Painting some details on the sails was one of the most tempting ideas that had crossed Lucifer’s mind in the past month, but, exceptionally, his common sense won over and he left them with some minor shading. The way Michael’s head thudded back with a silent relieved groan made him smile. The elder could take a bullet to the shoulder or scraps in his hip and march forward, but obviously enduring hours under the constant nerve-wrecking buzz of needles was something different.

It was only the fiddle-head he designed in the shape of an angel and some touch up in the background’s shading. And the surprise star up over Michael’s heart. Just thinking about it made Lucifer giddy, like he felt before his first tattoo. Lucky, the machine buzzed in his hand just right to counterbalance its shaking.

They traded small stories when Michael started to pump his fist and grew disturbingly restless. After two hours it was forgivable. Sort of. But not enough for Lucifer to let him up without an open admittance of defeat.

Lucifer told Michael about the idiots he had worked with. How some people were too dumb to understand that tattoos don’t work like pens, that time has a toll on them as well, and how he might be an awesome genius and the best in what he did (and also not boasting, just honest) there were just things that cannot be crammed on a calf. (The idea included sharks, a juke box, rainbow and Lucifer tuned out at this point, and passed the client to Ruby.)

“So, back to your tattoo… You’ve never wanted to be a Marine, right?” Lucifer had to ask, because, while he was like 99.9% sure about this, there was just a pale note flying about that there was some connection with Michael and Marines.

“It’s not really my thing.”

“Then why a ship?” ‘Cause while Michael always had a thing for flying, he never bothered to apply for joining the Air Force either. “A flying one on top of all?”

“It’s up to you to find out.”

“Come on, just a hint.”

“I told you, you can guess on your own.”

Lucifer pouted.

“Wait, you don’t have a crush on that John Winchester fella, do you?”

Michael did his equivalent of choking on his breath. It was less spluttering and actual choking and more of his eyes narrowing.

“How did you make _that_ connection?”

“You hang out a lot.” The Winchesters became the first main characters in Michael’s stories right after the newbies at bootcamp and Raphael.

“Our sons are best friends,” Michael rolled his eyes. “Besides, our parents hanged out a lot too, yet you don’t accuse your dad of having a crush on mine.”

“God, that would be truly awful. Thanks for scarring me for life.”

“You’re welcome.”

“You’re welcome,” Lucifer echoed under his breath with seething sarcasm. Michael only laughed. “So, no deceased Marine friends from the army?”

“I’d have you put a date on the ship otherwise.”

Lucifer hummed. Yeah, obviously. He had passed up enough in memoriam tattoos in his career.

Flying ships. What even the hell?

Michael had never been one for ships or sailing. That one time the Shurleys took all three kids to a lake for the summer Michael was the last one to board the boat when Gabriel and Lucifer had already tried their best to break it down to scraps before it even set out, and was screaming at Lucifer to calm down they were rocking the boat too much!

So Lucifer could state that Michael was afraid of sailing. Funny enough the man wanted a ship tattooed on his side.

Time for guesses out of the blue.

“Okay, next guess is Flying Dutchman?”

“Hmm… Getting warmer.”

That slightly threw Lucifer to the loop. On the one hand he was a genius, and he patted himself on the shoulder, but then what?

Before he could guess further though, Michael’s phone went off in his pocket.

“The brat cannot do without Daddy for a day?”

His only answer was a devastating sharp look.

After half a minute of rainclouds gathering on the plains of Michael’s forehead, the man sagged, and sank back on the table.

“It’s not election year yet, is it? So, credit card balance?”

Michael shook his head with weariness only he could ever muster. “I’ll need a new number.”

“Ex-girlfriend throwing a tantrum on you? I believe you said there was no one in sight.”

“I’d be in big enough trouble if a girlfriend sent me messages like ‘Admitting your sin is the first step to salvation’, ‘we’re praying you repent and come to your senses’ and so like.”

“You’re kidding, right?”

“They have just as good sense of humour as I do.”

“Want me to get that sect off your back?”

“I’ll consider your offer.”

Now, really, Lucifer had been referring to Michael’s congregation as a sect for years, but how do they come to dare ad interfere in Michael’s personal life so deep? Accusing him of sodomy, adultery, he was lucky murder and treason hadn’t come up yet, but Lucifer was sure it was just behind the corner.

Michael had never had but girlfriends and never had been married, so there is no one to cheat on, and whenever he was in a relationship he was painfully loyal, so what? Beyond all he had a son he loved and cherished and even took the life-threatening danger of putting the boy in front of Lucifer.

Who gave them the right to assume from a hug, Lucifer’s goddamn tattoos, and a kiss that never happened, and no one, in fact, had seen, that there was anything sinful going on in Michael’s life?

He was going to collect numbers and addresses and unleash the real power of Satan’s wrath on these bigoted assholes!

 


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> That hug, and that kiss that never happened

 

True enough, Lucifer used to hate the brat. On the sole principle that he took up most of Michael’s time.

Whenever on leave, Michael wanted to spend as much time with his son as possible.

It was understandable since he experienced what an absent father could do. At the time Lucifer made sure the elder had felt such consequences for days and even after then the marks remained visible. And Lucifer respected that in Michael. Honestly. He sure would have went to beat some sense into that thick skull army or not if Michael turned out to be a father anything like his own.

But also there was the point he had never even had to entertain the thought seriously of Michael becoming an actual father.

Lucifer was proud and jealous by nature and he demanded attention and love. And when it was denied from him he grew petty and vengeful. He was like the snake, lapped up, curling in on himself nursing his wounded cold heart looking at everyone passing by viciously and baring his teeth dripping with venom if they were foolish enough to tread close.

They barely talked for the next months after Christmas.

Until it suddenly changed on a Wednesday evening in April.

After having ignored all his calls during the day he was tipsy enough by 8.30 that he missed the buttons on his phone and Lucifer had to answer his call.

As for how the conversation went, well, it was a little fuzzy, but the alarm vibrating in Michael’s stifled tone made getting on a plane immediately a good idea. During the flight, nursing a forming headache Lucifer could make up only fragments, but they were enough to make cold, uncertain fear coil in his guts. Words like hospital, accident, and Castiel.

When he arrived next morning, darkness still hugged intimately the death-coloured hospital. He thought he would look actually worse than Michael. Hurt pride and a hangover didn’t make anyone look more appealing, but he was sorely mistaken.

In the waiting room Michael was like a dark flame that swallowed more light in its agony of paradoxical existence. The man was pale, dark purple circles around his hollow, sickly gleaming eyes, and the ripe mango coloured bruises and stitches on his arm and jaw, nor the cast bracing his left wrist could make him look any more alive.

“Michael,” Lucifer called out for him. “What happened?”

“I’m sorry,” was all he got as a response for half of the day, which only served for Lucifer’s temper to blow up.

“I’m _sorry_?! Sorry for what the fuck exactly?!”

It wasn’t nice but the sterile white walls quickly grew thick with tension. Layers of venomous hissing, creased by sharp glances and malicious insults, until finally Michael broke and in clipped words explained that Castiel was sick, had been for days with what he assumed was whooping-cough, and just as Michael was about to take him to the doctor…

There came a long silence that pissed Lucifer off. And while he was getting worried sick, too, because there was no fucking way Michael would be so worked up over just some seasonal sickness, (and why the fuck did he look like a car had gone over him?!) he refused to even acknowledge Lucifer’s presence for the next minutes. He just, _closed up_.

Eventually, when the blond stormed off he bumped into Mary Winchester, just on her way to check in on Michael (who, at this point was sitting with a painfully straight spine at little Castiel’s bed). She explained, that yes, it was a car that accidentally swivelled into Michael’s just as he buckled Castiel in. It was their luck it came from the driver’s side. If one can call such thing lucky.

Back from their coffee-run, because Lucifer still needed some time to cool down, after casting a glance at Michael sitting on the edge of Castiel’s bed, caressing the boy’s forehead and murmuring gentle words into the tousled black locks Mary put a hand just below Lucifer’s elbow.

“I’m glad you could make it.”

Lucifer only arched a brow. He was about to take his leave, thank you very much. He wasn’t welcome here at all, not to mention needed. He was no good with this support crap.

“He does need you,” she smiled with the all-knowing force of a mother.

“Not really. We just fought.”

“But he sits more like an actual person. Not like a piece of stone.”

.

The day crawled on with a speed any slug could beat.

Either Lucifer watched Michael put up the strong face that grew from a big brother’s to a father’s smile of strength, or when Castiel slipped back into sleep they sat side by side, shoulders just a breath away from touching, _waiting_. Waiting for doctor’s reports. Waiting for when Michael could take his son home. Waiting for Michael to open up.

Michael talked to the doctors and Lucifer took care of the small talk with John and Mary. They were nice people.

All along Michael was being eaten alive by a leviathan from the inside, lips only a firm line, no sound of cries for help escaping. If there were any.

.

They spent the night dozing on the uncomfortable bench in the waiting room, by the early hours of morning, everything still and unmoving, Lucifer found his head resting on Michael’s thigh, and warm fingers absentmindedly playing in his hair. As he looked up, however, his bleary eyes caught the hard look on Michael’s face.

It became immediately clear why they hadn’t been kicked out of the place.

.

All morning Michael had been talking to the doctors. Just from the set of his shoulder Lucifer knew that he was stressed out and wanted to blow something up. Or maybe someone.

By the afternoon it definitely turned into someones.

Even though he grew up with no blood-brothers Michael adapted to become the elder sibling of both Lucifer and Gabriel, and even if the blond had cursed him into the dead of nights at least once a week, he was the best big brother anyone could ever ask for. Always strong, and though short in temper, he was reliable. A mountain would move sooner than Michael when he set his mind to something. He grew into the role of the Archangel Michael, guarding his family with his blazing sword.

Yet he had two spots where he could be attacked from. The exact same that gave him his strength – _responsibility_ and _faith._

About half an hour ago a man and a woman entered the waiting room.

They glanced around, when they eyes caught on Lucifer they visibly cringed. This close to crossing themselves they turned rather to Mary to ask about Michael, saying they were from his congregation and came to show support from the community.

Lucifer didn’t trust their smiles a bit.

He was _right_. Only if he wasn’t!

When Michael returned from the chapel, oh man, was he _devastated_. Demons, and angels, and all kings and royalties of the Earth would run from his path; stars perished in his eyes, and the gleaming dust was threatening to spill from his eyes.

He marched right up to Lucifer, and in that moment no past injuries of pride, no jealousy, no scars mattered. Because Michael’s was fresh, and raw, and salt was just rubbed into the whole length of it.

Lucifer opened up his arms, and as puzzle pieces clicking in place Michael stepped into his embrace, just where he belonged. The younger became the force to break dams, to crack the earth over a long-slumbering volcano, a chest to trust, and arms that held. A place where they both were equally vulnerable.

Michael stood, head bowed and painfully still.

There was no change in the pattern of his breathing. His shoulders didn’t shake with the force of his sobs. The world weren’t strong enough to stand in the howl of his agony. Only stardust poured on Lucifer’s shoulder, soaking the shirt on his collarbone.

As Lucifer wrapped his arms around him, he made sure the demonic eye tattooed red and inky soulless black on the back of his left hand was glaring right at those _supporters_.

.

On the night their trials finally came to an end and Michael finally laid Castiel down in his own, finally comfortable and warm bed the two men were standing in the darkness of the living room. No one really thought about switching the lights on. Silhouettes seemed to be the only things either of them could take at the moment.

Doubts, wandering thoughts stifled the air and made the silky night scratchy and rough.

How could one address what had happened in the hospital? Should the silence even be cracked? Threaten the truce, the momentary peace by one accidental spark of a fight?

Before Lucifer’s mind could go overdrive warm hands cupped his face, and Michael was…

Michael was really, really close, his breath fanning on the blond’s chin—

In one second stretched into one impossible eternity Michael leaned up that one inch he needed and pressed his dry, desperation-tasting lips to the corner of Lucifer’s mouth.

Lucifer stood stock still.

He could taste the fear, feel the lightning bolt that struck Michael immediately at the contact, the one that made him rile back, stumble, so uncharacteristically unsure and terrified of himself – not even the scraping claws of the cold night air that slipped in the crack of an almost-kiss could wipe away that paralyzing, raw taste.

“Ah, I- I’m sorry,” Michael stammered, barely above the sound of the wind rattling outside.

All Lucifer could do was stare back into those huge blown eyes.

“It’s okay.” He hoped some voice accompanied the stumbling move of his lips.

A blink later Michael slammed heavy teller doors on any trail of fear. Soon, he was back to his steeled, disciplined self.

“I’ll check in on Castiel,” he said softly. “Your place is ready as always.”

And he slipped away leaving Lucifer alone to hate himself, and then both of them. To name for what, exactly, would take too many old wounds to tear up.

 


	10. Chapter 10

 

It seemed that no matter what their meetings always had to end up in disasters.

After Michael slipped away into Castiel’s room and Lucifer reluctantly stretched out on Michael’s bed, as per his usual place, there was just no way he could close his eyes and rest. The memory of Michael’s chapped lips at the corner of his mouth stole the breath away from his lungs. The darkness turned suffocating; the fading scent of the other on the pillow and the sheets was like inhaling scratchy incense fumes.

Despite all that he waited wide awake, counting off the folds of the curtains. But when Michael didn’t turn up after hours of tossing Lucifer made up his mind. He wasn’t going to make a fool of himself, showing how worked up he was.

Sunrays barely tickled the edges of the horizon, and with his bag thrown on one shoulder Lucifer glanced into the living room, then into Castiel’s room where he finally found Michael; drifting somewhere among uneasy dreams mixed into the illusion of wakefulness perched in an armchair next to his son’s bed.

“Michael,” Lucifer called out gently. He didn’t reach the other’s shoulder when he suddenly jerked awake.

Darkened eyes glimmered with alert.

“It’s just me,” Lucifer hurried to assure him.

“Something wrong?” Michael asked, his voice hoarse. The way he gripped the arm of the chair showed how much he wanted to jump to his feet, fear and desperation cutting his world in half as lightning strikes in a storm, but all that light illuminated the whole room as well. Michael’s new barriers, Castiel, and all the old bounds they probably could never squeeze past no matter what they do.

“No,” Lucifer shook his head tightly. “I’m just going. Now that everything’s fine.”

Michael cut a quick glance at the sleeping Castiel. “I’ll give you a ride to the airport.”

“Don’t worry about it. My taxi just arrived.” It took all tiny morsels of his pride collected to be able to say the next sentence putting out the last slight spark of hope in Michael’s eye. “I’ll see myself out.”

And that was it.

.

Afterwards Lucifer had his own personal share of Hell, the only worse time being when Michael announced he was going to Iraq. In their final (and then it seemed dreadfully _Final_ ) argument Michael tore the golden sword from his neck and threw it away, features hard and unforgiving, something that still haunted Lucifer to the day.

Again and again he was forced to realize how much Michael meant to him.

An anchor, even when they so passionately hated each other they could make fire rain from the skies, a steady strong presence who knew everything about him – because eventually he _always_ confessed.

Lucifer could take God betraying him. Damn, it was so easy to throw away his faith, but this? How could he handle when he cut himself off from his guardian angel as well?

He became irritated, edgy, easily angered and quick to lash out. Several times he had been threatened to be thrown out of the tattoo parlour and he could go back travelling around the country if he didn’t change his attitude.

When Gabriel came up to him to try and talk some sense into the chaos that was residing in place of the blond’s brain he accidentally struck a sensitive nerve, and it was only his luck and Lucifer’s insomnia taking the worst of him that Gabriel’s hand wasn’t pinned to the table with a knife.

There it was all bundled up in Lucifer’s skull. Nightmares, the curse of his too wild and vivid imagination, insomnia, the thick odour of smoke and turpentine oil that wormed its way into the furniture, his clothes, his inked up skin, and then the layer of ash and dust. Yet, they weren’t heavy enough to build up a barrier on the track of thoughts.

Michael didn’t call him. Occasionally some messages arrived to keep Lucifer updated on how the Shurley family was doing but there never was any question posed at the end. Nothing that actually indicated a call for him to actively pick up the conversation.

Or was it?

Was it time for Lucifer to address their problem?

Should it be addressed at all?

Should he bring up that almost-kiss?

He still didn’t know what he thought about it. Maybe he tried to keep huge iron gates closed with all his might so that he could wonder and eat himself up some more, but he couldn’t tell for real!

Or maybe Michael was the one afraid of the time when Lucifer’s reaction would blow up in his face? Ruining everything they had ever had?

Or was it finally Lucifer’s fucking time to grow up, put his vanity and pride aside and initiate a proper, calm conversation?

No. That sounded ridiculous and impossible. _Impossible_.

He didn’t even notice when he had poured his heart and all his desperation out to Abaddon – friends with benefits since forever, but everything had its limits. Like no mentioning of the awkward week right after Lucifer forgot that Michael hadn’t left for home yet, and so the elder just walked in on Lucifer and Abaddon working off some steam together. Surprisingly, there had been no big fuss at all. Only Michael’s smiles grew even rarer, but that had been a constant decline in that so connecting one and one might have been a bit… liberal? Pompous? Self-important?

Either way it was never to be mentioned. Along with Michael.

Yet, when Abaddon suggested “Why don’t you just text him back?” so casually that it hurt, it actually stuck with Lucifer for some reason.

Maybe only because Lucifer’s nerves were finally giving in on him.

Either way, one night when he found himself sitting in front of a canvas full of dancing wings made of light waltzing with shadows and dripping darkness on the rainbow coloured shards of chaos, the stud of his cigarette barely dangling from his lips, covered in layers of paint that would only come off along with his skin Lucifer fished his phone out from under a heap of clothes, and after long minutes of pondering on what to write he sent a text message to Michael.

Then and there in the middle of the night it said:

_?_

Pretty eloquent, huh?

Lucifer was just about to throw the phone back in the corner when it lit up with a reply.

_Whh are u stil awakw???_

_Painting_ —was all Lucifer answered simply. His overworked heart was thumping in his throat making him feel sick.

_Show me—_ Michael answered back, now awake himself.

Lucifer lit another cigarette, wiped his fingers as best as he could, then fumbled with his phone for a good five minutes before he could snap a picture of his headache inducing painting.

And that was it.

Them. Talking again. As if nothing had happened.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, that's all I have for now. I hope you liked it :)
> 
> And just as with my other fics I update pretty irregularly, and I really need the stimulation, because if I'm left for my spontanuous inspiration for what I want to write I nowadays might rather end up with Samifer... Which obviously isn't good for the progress of this fic. *sighs* Please bear with me!


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lucifer and Michael are sleeping together. But-- but not like /that/!

 

It was the middle of June the next time Lucifer agreed to go and visit Michael and Castiel. With another huge load of issues squeezed behind a dam that was already leaking nightmares and awfully, embarrassingly pleasant dreams, but Lucifer could manage. What was another thirty years to survive, huh?

He was supposed to spend the weekend at Michael, and most preferably also trying to bond with Castiel– now that the boy wasn’t sickly pale and mostly unconscious. _Fantastic._

It was supremely the airline’s fault that it was already 7 p.m. when he arrived. Cutting a few hours back from the torture he willingly exposed himself to was only natural. He wasn’t _that_ masochistic after all.

And still, it took Lucifer several deep breaths to stay, and he really just caught his feet from backpedalling from the doorstep. He quickly rang the bell, the casual _ding-dong_ , _ding-dong_ providing enough distraction from memories of the last time he stood right there.

The door opened.

“Daddy says it’s rude to ring a bell so long.”

Lucifer took a quick double take of the situation: his finger still on the bell-button, and it was tiny Castiel in a Superman T-shirt clinging to the doorway. _Whoops._ Just as he forced a smile on his face that hopefully didn’t look like he wanted to devour the kid in whole, Michael appeared in the lobby with the sternest frown to ever frown directed at Castiel’s back.

“Castiel, what did I tell you about opening doors?”

The kid flinched, as if he was just smacked upside the head. He turned away from Lucifer, little hand bunching up the material of his shirt, exposing a good half of his round belly, looking up at his father, truly ashamed.

“But it was wingin’ so mush,” he mumbled.

“You don’t open doors to strangers without me.”

“You said Loosh was coming over.”

Lucifer couldn’t believe his ears. Was that supposed to be _him_?  Was this whined, sing-song one-syllable word _his_ name?

Michael seemed to read the incredulity mixed bafflement thickening in the air for he shot Lucifer a bemused look before turning back to his son.

“You don’t open the door without me.” Michael said with finality.

“Yes, Daddy,” Castiel mumbled, then he actually turned to close the door in Lucifer’s face if Michael didn’t sweep him up and placed the boy on his hip.

“It’s okay, Castiel,” he said, all stern edges melting off his voice. “Now, say hi to Luce.”

“Hi,” and it was only so much for little Castiel to lose his attitude. He hid his face in Michael’s shoulder and only gave a shy little wave to Lucifer. Who only waved back. No need to force socialization just yet.

“Hello, Lucifer,” Michael said.

The hand clapped down on Lucifer’s shoulder was warm, _hot_ with the force of a concealed movement vibrating in his wrist as he just stopped himself from pulling Lucifer into a hug.

That… hadn’t happened since… well, since Michael first came back from war.

“Was I interrupting something,” Lucifer asked easily as if he didn’t notice anything, “because I could come back in a bit.”

“Took you long enough to arrive,” Michael all but pulled him in from the doorstep. “Still, you couldn’t skip dinner time.”

“Whee!” Lucifer said voice flat, almost resigned.

It wasn’t that Michael was a bad cook. It’d been long years since he nearly burnt down the whole kitchen in his first apartment, and surely had had to practice a lot with his son around, just… the elder lacked certain amount of creativity not to follow the recipe’s orders to the letter.

Michael clapped Lucifer on the back as he ushered him inside.

Lucifer was relieved. The house was warm, just as the air outside and the welcome hug he didn’t receive. Michael’s radiance, the darkened emerald glimmer in his eyes never ceased to make Lucifer’s heart want to beat out of his chest. Only the lack of an actual curling shadow at the corner of his mouth, the barely stirring shadows on his face made the crazy drumming painful until the threat of tears welling up in Lucifer’s eyes.

Injuries can be covered but some just cut too deep. Yeah. Fuck his life.

.

Dinner went down probably much more eventful than Michael had hoped for.

It started all with Lucifer noticing Castiel obediently stuffing his face with the vegetables next to his dinosaur-shaped meat cakes, which, obviously, wasn’t a really child-like behaviour. So, after making sure that he had the boy’s attention, Lucifer started to casually push his own boiled broccoli to the     edge of his plate. Then, as soon as the frown appeared over Castiel’s brows (seriously, why had Lucifer _ever_ doubted he was Michael’s kid?) Lucifer started complaining (“You really should take some cooking courses from Gabriel. He’s cutting back on sugar, and it’s finally edible for everyone.”) to distract Michael.

The result was a finely shaped chaos when after about five minutes Castiel stated that he was done eating, can he go play a bit before sleepy-time? Michael absentmindedly nodded his approval before he actually checked his son’s plate. He grabbed the tiny arm just in time before he could escape eating his vegetables.

“But Loosh doesn’ have to, too!” Castiel protested, trying his tiny best again at the whining and kicked puppy looks. (He could pronounce Lucifer’s name without a glitch, it was just the whining that could drive Michael up the wall.)

“He has to, and he will,” Michael said sternly cutting a sharp look at Lucifer. “Right, Luce?”

Lucifer scoffed. He crossed his arms over his chest peevishly. “No way.”

At the same time of Castiel’s tiny “See?” sounded Michael’s warning tone of “ _Luce_.”

Oh, that one syllable had all the onslaught power of an angelic army rushing at him with blazing swords, but Lucifer should be damned if he didn’t have the whole nine circles of Hell at his own.

“No. I’d eat a sponge sooner than _these_.”

It obviously could have been easily arranged, and certainly if Michael’s hand wasn’t full with his child in a second Lucifer would have had to fight off a washcloth being stuffed into his mouth. Thank goodness for small mercies and that Michael was determined to keep his cool and authority, so it took rather long minutes until Castiel got bored of Daddy’s stern looks and climbed back into his chair.

Meanwhile Lucifer cackled like a maniac internally. So much, there were tears welling up in his eyes. But they didn’t conceal his vision enough that he didn’t check for the closest escape root in case Michael wanted to gut him with a spoon.

.

Eventually everyone came out alive as the ultimate reason of “You’re not going anywhere until the plate is empty,” and Michael’s eternal patience trained and improved to inhuman levels at boot camp paid off.  

Right now Castiel was watching some cartoons in the other room while Michael put the remaining into the fridge, and Lucifer eyed a spot through the door in the living room as if it had personally offended him.

“That wall is outrageously empty,” he mumbled.

Michael followed his gaze. “I was hoping to hang one of your pictures there,” he shrugged, “Only you haven’t offered one yet.”

The accusation should make Lucifer uncomfortable, except—

“I had offered to paint for you.”

“How do I hang a tattoo on the wall?” Oh dear god, if the boy inherited Michael’s sense of humour the family was damned.

“You don’t, ‘cause you can always carry it around.”

“I keep my wallet for that.”

“That can be stolen,” Lucifer tried.

“No. My answer is still no for a tattoo.”

.

After Castiel was tucked in bed, they talked. As if Lucifer hadn’t shut Michael out of his life for weeks when the other probably would have needed some support the most.

They chatted about Lucifer’s rediscovered obsession with roses and gardening, and how were the chances for him planting and nourishing an apple tree into growing fruits in his apartment. Michael found the idea ridiculous, what with the frequency of Lucifer’s hangovers and how he hated light sneaking into his room before noon, but the blond was determined.

Also in retaliation Lucifer tried to convince Michael of fucking finally calling his poor son any different than the whole long monstrosity of Cas-ti-el, because it was freaking long and a mouthful.

In conclusion neither of them budged. Michael was still calling his boy Castiel (“That is his given name, he should wear it with pride.” “How, if no one can remember it properly?”), and Lucifer was still mentally measuring how big pot he would need for his baby apple tree.

.

“Do you mind?” Lucifer asked shaking his packet of cigarettes in Michael’s face.

“Not in my house.” Michael said without looking up from his scribbling.

“Come on,” Lucifer drawled, draping himself over all the papers scattered on the dinner table. Seriously, did organizing a birthday party require such serious planning as if Michael wanted to invade the street commanding a garrison of mutant gummy bears? He still had two months until Castiel’s birthday! “Don’t you want to smoke the peace-pipe with me?”

“Aren’t we at peace? Besides, I don’t smoke.”

“I can aggravate you enough for that. Wanna bet?”

Michael finally looked up to glare at Lucifer. He only flashed a sweet smile. Crawling half over the table so that he could take up his rightful place only a breath away from Michael’s Epic Frown of Disapproval he playfully tilted his head.

“Just a drag, Michael. Or should I breathe it into your mouth?”

“Again?” Michael shot back with a tinge of aggravation in the colour blooming high on his cheeks.

“ _Again?_ ” Lucifer repeated head tilted curiously. “Have I tried it before? Must have been pretty drunk.”

“High… You were actually pretty high.”

“Did I succeed though?” He didn’t even try to mask up the excitement in his voice, only the wolfish grin spread wider and wider.

Michael snorted. His eyes blinked to the side. “No. What do you think?”

“That it’d be a damn shame if I don’t remember it.”

“I could have told you all my dirty secrets and you wouldn’t even remember we talked,” Michael said standing from his seat.

“’cause I know them anyway.” Lucifer drawled. He leaned back in his chair to watch Michael load the washing machine. It was a nice sight.

The sardonic, soft _Sure_ was totally lost on him.

.

With the fresh scent of the night mingling with the curling smoke on his skin Lucifer felt his way through the darkened corridor to Michael’s room to grab his night wear before he went to check out if Michael had loaded up the guest room or not. So that he would be prepared where to be headed after a shower.

He managed to open the door without a sound and even locate his bag in front of the wardrobe. Short after he started rummaging for a clean pair of boxers Michael called out, hoarsely.

“Luce, if you sleep on the couch so help me God I’ll murder you in the morning.”

An impossible and pathetically wide grin threatened to split Lucifer’s face in half; his heart jumped in his throat, and it took him a great special effort to keep the mirth out of his voice. Compelling his mouth to twist back into one of his trade-mark smirks he carefully climbed on the bed with Michael’s half-asleep form caged between his arms, one knee bumping into the curve of the other’s ass under the covers.

“I thought you didn’t like me stinking up your four-poster bed princess,” Lucifer purred while he rubbed his stubble-covered cheek on Michael’s naked shoulder. “But in that case I’ll just leave out the shower,” he flopped down on top of Michael, “also brushing my teeth,” and also exhaled deep into the other’s face.

His laughter was muffled in the crook of Michael’s shoulder as he pushed Lucifer’s smoke stinking mouth away from his nose.

“Just wash up and come to sleep already.”

With one last move before he threw Lucifer off the bed Michael ruffled the blond mop of hair in a fashion that was a recurring habit still from their childhood. Another affectionate move that was strictly Lucifer’s privilege.

On silent feet Lucifer danced off into the bathroom.

When he took up his part of the king sized bed Michael was already just barely clinging to the world of the awake. He almost fooled Lucifer, but it was really more sleep than wakefulness as the older snuggled up in Lucifer’s blissfully cool and wet side.

.

Now there, no one had the right to think about _anything_ going on here. They had been sleeping together ever since Lucifer became agile enough to climb trees without breaking an arm, and also since they perfected the volume of knocking on the window that would wake Michael but not his parents. Which was somewhere around in first or second grade. Who counted, huh?

But strictly as in actually sleeping and in the same bed but That. Fucking. Was. _It_. Sleeping. In the same bed. End of discussion. Don’t listen to Gabriel, he knew shit.

(The little bastard would obviously miss to mention the part of the story when he begged with huge golden, tear-flooded eyes that Lucifer took him along to one of his nightly escapes; or how they occasionally woke with the boy snuggled in between them. More likely how Michael woke abruptly tumbled to the hard ground because Gabriel had kicked him out of his own bed and was now sprawled all over his brother.)

Actually, this whole sleeping in the same bed had only been an issue once.

Usually, by the time Michael arrived home for his leave Lucifer was single from the moment his plane touched American land (don’t question it, no one dared to), except for one time.

The brain of Lucifer’s boyfriend for the week froze on the spot when, while he just dropped by the blond’s apartment for some breakfast after work, he was suddenly greeted by a half-naked and sleep-mussed Michael just slipping out of Lucifer’s bedroom with a toothbrush dangling from his mouth.

Michael offered a polite wave before, unfazed, he continued on his track to the bathroom.

Boyfriend of the week stared, dumbstruck.

Lucifer didn’t blame him for that. Like really, who could be blamed who had ever laid eyes on that chest?

However, screaming bloody murder at such impossible hour of 6.30 am was truly unforgivable.

By the time Michael emerged from his shower with the steam still curling on his skin, Lucifer was happily single and sleeping as if nothing had happened.

 


	12. Chapter 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Domestic fluff with water-wars and nail-polish while Lucifer is giving up on riddles.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It took me an eternity to updtae, for which I'm thoroughly sorry, but I was working on my AngelcestBB fic and it took up all my time with the last weeks of school.
> 
> Thank you if you are still reading along, have a Happy New Year, and please enjoy this new update!

 

“You picked up fishing?” Lucifer shot another guess as he stretched to pop his spine back in its place.

Damn, maybe it wouldn’t be this painful being bent over Michael when both of them were a little bit more naked. Okay, how about _much_ more naked? – He mentally smacked himself. It’s been a while since he last got laid, and it was totally just his sex-drive talking. Thinking.

“No,” Michael answered in a sigh.

Lucifer frowned. “Honour? Bravery? Troubled past?”

“That’d be more for you.”

Wasn’t it to be called a day when Michael declared ever-trouble-making, drop-out, disgrace, little-bitch Lucifer honourable of all things?

The blond placed his elbow next to Michael’s shoulder. His thoughtful gaze unconsciously rested on the other’s face.

“A new beginning should have been two years ago.”

Lost in his musings he totally missed the little shadow flickering at the edge of Michael’s mouth.

.

 

Back in June Lucifer could recollect some memories from the godawfully early hours when only crazy people like Michael, and also little monsters like Castiel were awake. Memories varied from the pleasant warmth of Michael's back under his pillow-wrinkled cheek, to how nice the bed smelled, especially now, that it possessed a tinge of smoke he would just never be able to scrub from his skin. He blinked his bleary eyes, and at the foot of the bed, he thought, he caught sight of the little beast.  Castiel pouted, his chubby arms crossed over his equally chubby chest. Lucifer deemed the subject of the hushed conversation between father and son unimportant.  He was busy being asleep, thank you very much. 

"...s sleeping in my place."

"Come on, buddy..." Michael's deep purr resonated through his ribcage where Lucifer managed to squish his face against. "..." there was also something else said that was limited to a constant rumble. Lucifer groaned, giving sign of his disapproval. 

"Just for a wittle bit."

"Ten minutes.”

"Twenty?"

"You won. Okay."

Michael squirmed again, now pushing back against his bed-mate until he managed to relocate the pliant, sleep-heavy body at his original part of the bed. Not that Lucifer would be complaining (much), if he had been awake. He had a knee worked between Michael's thighs, an arm slung over his waist, and face right in-between the other man's shoulder blades.  If he were just half-conscious he would never want to get out of bed.

 

.

“Survival?”

“Not in particular.”

.

 

Lucifer had a difficult morning, what with the sun beating down on the back of his neck, and with a sadly empty cup gaping at him while he slumped over the kitchen table.

Michael’s kitchen was worse than a minefield. There was no way he’d go snooping for coffee. Michael owed him that much! (Who was nowhere to be seen around the house, and some note about him getting back in 30 just disappeared somewhere down the drain.)

The kids’ shrieking – crying out loud that “We oughtta keep quiet HUSH!” didn’t count for being quiet for fuck’s sake! – woke him just early enough that the sun glared in through that gap between the house wall and the porch roof, right into his face. Obviously, draping himself over the immaculate table was easier than pulling his chair, say, two feet to the left.

He had dozed a bit, or at least he assumed he did because otherwise he couldn’t jerk awake every now and then. Seriously, why weren’t children in the top ranks of causes of death charts?

The next time he snapped awake was when the kids skittered past him, one nearly falling flat on his face in one leg of his chair. When he heard the front door open, both devils were huddled behind the corner of the fridge.

“I’m home,” Michael called out from the entrance hall. “What, no one’s gonna greet me?”

Lucifer snorted a dry laugh at the tabletop. “Hey asshole.”

“Morning, Morning Star.”

Lucifer groaned.

“Hello, Dean!”

A gasp sounded from the hellhole. Then the blond boy shuffled into the light. “Hello, Uncle Mike.” Dean greeted his best friend’s father. “How did you know I was here?”

“If you want to keep it a secret don’t leave your bike in the front yard.”

“Oh.”

“Right.”

Dean’s little declaration of him and Cas going out to play was drown out by Lucifer’s choking laughter. It quickly grew into a belly-shaking laugh that threw him back in his chair. By the time his sides were aching he had nearly slipped to the ground as he gasped out between guffaws.

 “Uncle—Uncle. Mike? Re-heally? Uncle Mike?”

Michael patiently waited until he calmed down, panting sprawled out in his seat clutching his sides as if that was the only way to keep his body together. Oh boy, he hadn’t had a good laugh like this since forever!

“So,” he pressed out finally somewhat normal. “Have you grown old, _Uncle_ Mike?”

“I figured it’s retaliation for Castiel calling Mary Aunt Mary no matter what. It apparently makes her feel old,” Michael shrugged unloading his backpack onto the counter. “It’s either Uncle Mike or Mr. Shurley. For which I’m definitely not old enough.”

“You’re almost there.” Lucifer countered.

“Mhmm. Do you want to join the elder’s club?”

Now that he mentioned it, Lucifer hadn’t gotten an Uncle or Mr. attached to the Luce. Maybe he should show some gratitude, eh?

The warm spluttering of the coffee machine, though, was like music to Lucifer’s ringing ears. Thank all existing deities Michael didn’t take the little jibes to the heart. Otherwise Lucifer would just simply die in the kitchen of his way too bright Sun.

 

.

“Are you going spiritual on me? Like all those ship and storm stories with Jesus walking on water and shit?”

Michael hummed. “That honestly skipped my mind.”

.

 

Lucifer would never understand how Michael could put up with not only his boy but with Dean mixed in the daily programme as well. The otherwise shy and reserved Castiel turned into a mini Gabriel next to his friend. It was like – impossible to bear with energy. Yet somehow, Michael managed. And Lucifer hated him for it.

He didn’t care that Michael ‘owed’ the Winchester family for looking after his son when he wasn’t home. He didn’t care that John and Mary needed every precious calm moment they got with baby Sam finally walking and running about as a perpetual-motion self-destructive machine. Getting bullied into joining the water-fight going on in the backyard was inhuman, witchcraft and definitely a violation of every treaties protecting various human rights.

With an impending sunstroke and half-deaf Lucifer totally felt violated in his rights to life.

Even though he made a bigger target, the children’s fine motor skills weren’t yet good enough to aim the soaked sponges to actually hit him. Not to mention to hit Michael. It was not supposed to be _this_ easy! Michael’s shirt was not supposed to be clinging to his chest like a second layer of skin proving a rather distracting sight. That was just—Ugh, Lucifer hated playing with kids.

When Dean dumped an armful of sponges in the inflatable pool Lucifer simply stepped out of the water to avoid a few clumsy shots.

Clearly he didn’t have enough coffee to make up with so much light, and heat, and energy-vampire kids.

Castiel’s shriek of exhilaration jerked him out of his musings as a sponge bounced off his side, leaving a dark wet spot on his shirt.

“Cas, you’re out!” Dean cried.

Lucifer only missed Little Nightmare.2 by an inch. (Okay, so maybe playing dodge-ball wasn’t that bad when it eventually hit Michael’s hip. Damn those jeans were tight!)

“No! ‘M not!” Castiel called back.

“Oh? But I can clearly see the hitmark,” Michael said, while slow and menacing like a hunting panther circled the pool to near his son.

“But I’m invinsile!”

“It’s In-vin-ci-ble, Cas!” Dean corrected.

“I AM!”

Next second, just in time with Michael’s grinning “Are you?” Castiel’s shriek rang along the whole street. As if the boy weighed nothing Michael picked him up and threw him over his shoulder.

“You can’t kill me! You can’t kill me!” Castiel chanted while kicking and flailing his arms around, sometimes landing an accidental little flap on his father’s broad back.

While Lucifer just stood and watched, honestly but not officially bewitched by the teeth-flashing blinding grin on Michael’s face, Dean sprinted at the man both arms full of soaked up sponges. He totally didn’t care that his own Batman T-shirt was getting drenched as he ran into Michael’s hip in a kamikaze-mission. In the middle of the short-lived fight everyone got soon really wet, and in the end it was only Michael declared dead and out, since both boys claimed themselves as invincible.

“Okay now,” Michael said after a while setting the two boys back on their feet. “Why don’t we get dry before lunch?”

He helped them get out of their soaked shirts, and was just about to pull his own off over his head when Dean pulled at one fold of his jeans.

“What is it?”

Dean motioned for Michael to lean down, but even though he at least managed to grasp the point of whispering secrets, pointing at Lucifer made it quite suspicious what he wanted. Especially when straightening Michael asked with a semi-mischievous expression “Is that so?”

“No.” Lucifer said, trying to maintain as much dignity and hostility in his looks as he could glaring at his childhood best friend while backing away. “Don’t you dare—! _MICHAEL!_ ”

To his own misfortune Lucifer just happened to make his retreat in the direction of the pool, his feet catching on the inflatable ring. So it didn’t prove too hard for Michael to lock his arms around the blond’s middle and as an unstoppable force tackle him into the water.

Even with the elder consciously blocking a part of the fall it hurt. It fucking hurt and Lucifer didn’t appreciate his nose filling with water. It didn’t help much that by the time he surfaced from the calf-deep water, spluttering and coughing up curses Michael sat next to him, legs still entwined, laughing with his head thrown back.

“You bastard!” Lucifer cried.

The next moment he was straddling Michael’s waist in an attempt to put his hands around the brunet’s neck and drown him into his own child’s pool.

It took the whole bunch nearly another half an hour to scramble out of the water and hang their clothes on a string to dry.

By the time John came over to remind his oldest son that his mother didn’t appreciate little boys being late from lunch, they were nearly all dry, Lucifer and Michael on the doorstep (since Lucifer wasn’t allowed to smoke in front of the children, but damn if he was willing to put up this great amount of stress without nicotine) and Cas and Dean playing in the sandbox.

Lucifer grumbled. Of course he did, because it would have been really strange if in the short course of one day he grew overly fond of this little cheesy-family drama. But he would secretly treasure all the blooming bruises on his side (a proof of the kids’ flailing limbs), along with the memory of Michael’s bright smiles and the weight of his arm around Lucifer’s waist.

 

.

“Naomi died quite a while ago, too…”

Michael nodded along solemnly.

It was in a way soothing. Lucifer wasn’t sure if he could finish the tattoo as he had planned it if he was about to learn it was to remember Castiel’s mother.  The flood of jealousy coiling burning cold in his belly was still present even after five years of last meeting the woman.

.

 

Moving into the suburb and playing Daddy made Michael surprisingly bitchy. Not only had he complained about Lucifer’s smoking habits on end (even though they finally moved away from labelling it as a mortal sin) but now even the scent of nail polish was driving the elder up the wall. Needless to say Lucifer took special satisfaction in lining _all_ the little bottles he had opened in a line to pick which one he fancied on his nails that weekend.

Michael only rolled his eyes and murmured something about having two children under his roof.

Castiel, on the other hand, finally worked up his courage to climb onto the other stool next to Lucifer, and clinging to the tabletop peer at the fine brush strokes covering the pink nails in dark blue. Lucifer glanced up at the boy – on his face sat the same intense concentration that was so characteristic of his father before an exam. He didn’t say a word, just went back to painting his middle finger.

“Why are you doing that?” Castiel asked.

“Because it’s pretty.” Lucifer answered, blowing at his nails.

“Like the pictures on your body?”

“You like those?”

Castiel nodded enthusiastically, eyes shining with wonder.

“Hear that, Michael? Your son wouldn’t mind a tattoo on you.”

Before Michael could snap back that he didn’t care, Castiel’s head whipped around in a way that even Lucifer cringed at. Damn, the little monster was growing on him.

“Daddy wants a tattoo?”

“No!”

“Not even that archangel Michael I was telling you about?”

“No.”

“The one with the spear—“

“No.”

“It’d fit just fine on your shoulder.”

“No.”

“Can I have one?” Castiel piped in, his head constantly turning from one adult to the other as if he was watching a tennis match. “Daddy?”

Michael’s face lost all colour in one second just for all of it to flush back in a heartbeat. The last time Lucifer saw the other turn so red from collar to the tip of his ears was when Michael caught him making out with a guy in high school who looked disturbingly a lot like the elder.

“No, Castiel. They don’t wash off. You know, we’ve talked about this yesterday.”

“And these?” the boy was too lost in the wonders of colours to be fazed by his father’s glare over his head that clearly told Lucifer _I’m going to kill you_.

Lucifer grinned in return, “Don’t bring your child’s creativity down, Micha.”

For a second he was worried Michael would launch into a lecture about being a manly man and how painting one’s nails qualified as anything but! However, if possible, he only turned an even deeper shade of red, before he mumbled something that both Castiel and the Devil in human disguise understood as his consent and turned away.

“So, Cas,” Lucifer started pushing the wild, vibrant coloured little bottles in front of the boy (he knew purchasing these had to be the best deal of his life). “What colour do you prefer?”

 

A couple of minutes later when wine coloured clouds finally didn’t wreathe on the back of Michael’s neck and shoulder Lucifer was patiently waiting for his nails to dry (only a few seconds now), while he desperately tried to keep the smug smirk from stretching too suspiciously across his face. Castiel had the tip of his tongue between his teeth. Absorbed in his ministrations so deep that Lucifer would bet his long eyelashes fluttered creases in the surface of the paint. Which, incidentally, covered at least the whole knuckle of each finger. It might have been easier if he just dipped them into the bottles. They would have fitted in.

Finally finished painting his little finger Castiel shoved his hand under Lucifer’s nose.

“Lookit, Luce!”

The blond smiled. It was a surprisingly honest and merry smile.

“Nice. Why don’t you go and show your dad?”

In a dash Castiel slipped off the chair and right before Michael could turn around (heroically trying to mask up the feeling of impending horror on his face) the boy was at his side clinging to his belt loops, smearing the side of his jeans with pink and neon yellow nail polish.

“Daddy! Daddy! Am I pretty?”

Michael bent down to examine his son’s art work, for the moment uncaring for the state of his jeans.

“Of course, Castiel,” Michael said. “Especially this green ring finger.”

The boy’s face lit up like the Christmas tree. “It’s green. Because Dean’s favourite colour is green!”

“I’m pretty sure it’s blue,” Michael murmured straightening up.

Castiel paid the snide remark no heed, he probably didn’t even hear it, because he was there clinging to his father’s jeans again. “Daddy, daddy! You have to paint your nails too!”

“What? _Why_?”

“Because Luce has his blue nails. I have pink, and green, and yellow, and blue, and you have to too!”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea Castiel. I’m not that clever with my hands.”

“Nonsense,” Lucifer grinned. “Cas and I can do that for you.”

“Yes! Daddy, please!”

 

After five minutes of intense arguing Michael sat at the table, his fingers widely spread as if his hands were strapped down. If one only looked at his expression they would think his nails were being ripped from their beds. While in reality they were only getting painted.

During the whole process Castiel and Lucifer chattered like real BFFs, while Michael put his multilingual swearing ability to good use (though always careful to keep it low enough that there was no way his son could pick up any of the words). For the boy it proved to be an easier job than painting his own tiny pink nails, and, frankly, he did a pretty good job with the indigo polish. Even though, after the translucent, glittery layer was added and Castiel was munching on his sandwich Lucifer cleaned the accidental swipes from the nail beds.

“I need to take a picture,” Lucifer declared.

Nearly choking on his last bite, Castiel crawled on Michael’s lap and proudly showcased his pretty painted hands (there didn’t remain a lot of colour on his nails) while it took a few stern orders to get Michael to pull his own into the picture frame. He was acting as if he had some stinking, poisonous concoction smeared all over his fingers. When in reality it looked rather pretty. Like a small splash of night sky with the shyly glimmering stars.

“We look all pretty now,” Castiel declared.

“Yeah, sure,” Michael agreed with the weariness of a soldier fresh from a draining mission.

When the boy disappeared to prepare for his nap and Lucifer just turned back to cap his paint collection, he didn’t even have the time to gasp Michael was so close up in his face.

“You know this is the worst way of stealing a kiss,” _but oh, please don’t pull away!_

“How do I wash this thing off?”

On a second note maybe some shade of emerald would have complimented Michael’s eyes better. A metallic green.

“Not feeling macho enough?”

Michael gaped at him a little before his eyes narrowed to suspicious slits.

“Are you trying to challenge me?”

“Why, yes.” _No? Totally._ Lucifer grinned and sneaked an arm around Michael’s waist. It settled there perfectly.

“I’m not going anywhere like this.”

 

However final that declaration sounded after Castiel’s nap, and by the time they finished their re-run of Disney’s Peter Pan (long-long time of obligatory tradition) they went out to get some ice-cream. With Castiel swinging on their hands. And Michael blushing and scowling the whole way. Especially when it came to paying.

.

And there he was. Lucifer just finished the ship and totally ran out of general ideas why someone would want it tattooed on his side.

“Why can’t you just tell me?!”

Michael only smiled a wicked little smile.

.


	13. Chapter 13

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pixie dust ;)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yay, new update in a day? Wow, look at that New Year's miracle!
> 
> (this is the stranges thing to write while I feel very similar to suffering from a writer's block...)

 

“You are an insufferable asshole and I don’t know why I’m putting up with you.” Lucifer grumbled.

“The sentiment’s mutual. And I won’t allow you to give my son presents. Ever.”

“I thought I saved last Christmas.”

Michael snorted in agreement. “Yes, but then I didn’t have my nails painted _pink_ of all colours.” Cas had gotten a bit obsessed with painting nails after his last visit. Lucifer treasured the proof of that saved in several copies on his phone and computer. “I have a son, Lucifer.”

“Pink is a nice colour, don’t be such a sexist little bitch about it.” He only sent a magenta shade because Cas was five and kids his age liked vibrant colours. When he grew older – well, it would be neon pink all the same, but for the sole purpose of causing embarrassment.

Yet the memory of Cas’s birthday party faded quickly with the easy mood as well.

He frowned, absentmindedly running his finger along the edges of the cigarette pack hidden in his pocket Lucifer wondered what to ink where next. He felt so frustrated, like ants crawling under his skin or a million pins prickling the sensitive patches of the inside of his wrists and moving up the length of his arm, and then further down his back—

He _needed_ to know what the tattoo was for. _What,_ if three months back Michael was so vehement against getting inked up. What has changed?

“Besides, who would watch Disney with you?” Michael asked, placating after a longer rant about something.

“Disney…?”

_Oh… Oh!_

“Seriously?”

“What?”

“Oh, you must be fucking kidding me!”

“ _What_?!”

There was a tiny voice at the back of his head that warned he really shouldn’t ignore answering Michael when his voice reached this edgy demanding tone, but oh come on this was overly ridiculous but at the same time also so, so good.

Okay, he really had no reason to be this happy about his sudden revelation, but Lucifer just was. It made him feel so special – it was ridiculous how easily Michael could absorb that, truly _ridiculous_ but also _oh so amazing!_

“Lucifer, I didn’t—I didn’t say anything bad this time!” Michael pushed himself up on one elbow, “There’s no reason why we should fight even on—“

Lucifer felt inclined to squelch the word in Michael with his mouth on his, but God knows how that would be taken, so instead he just had his hand muffle the other’s rushed words.

“Shut up and lie back down.”

For a tense second Michael’s eyes seemed to glow under his furrowed brows, but soon he gave up, glanced heavenwards (no doubt with a short prayer for strength) and let his body fall back on the cushioned seat.

 

Michael had his tattoo done for Lucifer.

Well, for their shared childhood, which inevitably included Gabriel as well, but also all the years from that particular day in April when Michael rang the bell to their house, and when it was Lucifer who answered, he just pushed the tiny grey furball in his face with a dead-serious expression saying “It’s yours.” Even only five, short and still chubby Michael wasn’t good on questions and requests. In its imperfection, though, it was a perfectly strange first meeting. It foreshadowed all the angry screaming in their relationship. Conveniently the first took place already at such a tender age when Lucifer wasn’t allowed to keep the kitty _he was gifted with_.But it also included the comfort the elder boy offered in the warmth of his room just across the street, surrounded by brown and gold and small lead soldiers.

The tattoo was made in remembrance of the first time they watched Peter Pan (because Chuck and Becky was getting a headache from all the re-runs of the Lion King) and as soon as the credits started to roll they dashed out into the garden to hunt for a fairy. They wanted to fly to Neverland. They wanted to cross the sea, fly over the clouds, fight pirates and the crocodile with the clock in its belly.

It was made for all the fights they had over Becky’s ridiculous pink hat, the dismantled peg and the wooden sword. There had been vicious duels for the role of Peter Pan. Eventually though, Michael usually gave in to be Captain Hook (he could be the _captain_!) because he was older and had dark hair. When Gabriel joined the arguments became even more heated because now there was the role of Tiger Lily no one wanted to take. (Immediately, Michael grew really eager to play the Pirate Captain when the colour of his hair came up again at the role-allocation.)

It was also made for that one time they pulled their little chart to the top of the hill at the end of the street, and hinting golden sand all over it (and Gabriel) they rushed down the slope, shrieking with joy, pretending they were flying on the ship Lucifer just finished inking. Until one wheel got caught in the curb and the three of them went flying for real.

That afternoon marked the first of many trips to the hospital in Lucifer’s life.

Also the last time of their flying ship in action. The brothers’ parents just happened to be at home to witness the incident (and also hear both younger boys wail, and a few minutes of fruitless soothing attempts later Michael too joined into the chorus of weeping kids) and somehow all blame fell on the eldest of the group.

Michael was eight the first time he nearly drowned himself in guilt.

When his arm got better the first thing Lucifer painted during art class was the three of them on their sky-sailing boat. Just for good measure he dumped a lot of glitter on it. He gave it to Michael. It earned him the brightest smile in months.

Later on however, even though they were forbidden of such games for the remaining years while they could all fit themselves in the chart they still watched the movie at least once a week. Lucifer and Michael regularly climbed to the roof of the Shurley house and watched the stars, straining their eyes if they caught sight of flying children or golden ships.

Michael still had that painting.

Well, not the original one, because during one of their fights back in the day Lucifer had torn it to pieces, but a taped together scanned version in his wallet. Next to a picture of Castiel.

And now, while Michael had his wallet for those pictures all right, he was going to wear it under his skin as well. Forever and ever. For Lucifer, and for their times together and apart.

The tattoo wasn’t for Castiel – and it filled Lucifer with snow-like joy. It connected to the boy, of course, the apple of Michael’s eye, but only by that he hadn’t seen the movie just yet. He wasn’t interested in playing Peter Pan with his daddy or with his friend like they used to when they were little.

_It was for Lucifer._

And the star he had planned couldn’t have been a better choice.

Chances were that Michael had counted on Lucifer’s ages old jealousy and self-importance issues, and Lucifer loved him for that as much as he was annoyed with him for the very same reason.

But he could make it even better.

“Do you have any idea what a white tattoo is?” he asked casually as he rolled his chair over next to Michael’s left side.

“I think you’ve mentioned them once.”

“It’s like I’ll put my own hand-made artistic scar on you. A brand.”

“I’m certain you’ve left your fair share of scars on me.”

Lucifer’s lips curled into a smirk that would make anyone run for their lives, or at least cross themselves in fear of the Devil, but Michael knew better. He only smirked back.

“Do you do a lot of them, though?”

“White tattoos? No, not really. I mainly do angels, demons and devils, and that requires a lot of shading.” He mused for a short while. “But now I remember I once made a white wing on a shoulder. It was, well, unique.”

“I bet.”

When Lucifer pressed his fingers just over Michael’s heart he flinched a bit, biting back a small gasp.

“Ticklish?” Lucifer sneered turning on the tattoo machine for the last time that day.

“Are you taking much longer?”

“Cry-baby.”

“Brat.”

“Dick.”

“Shut up and finish this already.”

“Asshole.”

Lucifer only didn’t receive a smack on the top of his head because Michael knew all too well that tattoos were permanent.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, now I feel like the reasoning behind the tattoo is lame, but I drew the picture first and I used the ship from Peter Pan as a reference and then I thought the idea nice and fitting with all the flying and stuff. I hope this explanation wasn't too disappointing.   
> I assume you could guess the selfish reason behind the star Lucifer's about to put on Michael's chest, right?
> 
> Sorry, this is until the miracle lasts. There isn't much left just bear with me and my exams! I'll be back after the 13th!


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Update, because I'm on top of my procrastination game! XD  
> I hope you won't find it too lame!
> 
> Oh and [here ](http://omano-chan.tumblr.com/post/91197007068/so-did-i-get-it-right-lucifer-asked-smugly)is the picture that I drew to jumpstart this whole fic

Lucifer hummed a silly little tune to distract his mind from running in one thousand and some more directions, as he wiped Michael’s chest and side clean of the smeared paint and declared his masterpiece ready.

“Go on, check it out in the mirror,” he told Michal.

The anxiety curling in his belly got even tighter and surprisingly sickening as he couldn’t procrastinate any longer and had to accompany Michael in front of the mirror. He didn’t really know why exactly he was so worried seeing the other’s expression. Or hear if he liked the tattoo or not.

There was a tiny uplift at the edge of Michael’s lips. It made warmth bloom in his chest. He didn’t ruin that perfect torso after all.

“So. Did I get it right?” Lucifer asked smugly leaning against the side of the mirror. “Do I know you as good as you assumed?”

He watched the slow arch of one single, dark eyebrow. The soft shadows and patches of pale yellow light glided over Michael’s face painting his eyes a warm shade of green. The man took his time scanning in methodically every square inch of his new tattoo. The lazy movement of the white sails as the muscles shifted like the sky-coloured sea. Each flutter of the eyelashes counted a handful of tiny white stars, and slowly, very slowly Michael’s gaze finally settled on the bright scar-like star over his heart surrounded by a red hue of irritated skin.

The way Michael smiled made Lucifer’s insides flutter with the purest joy he could ever imagine.

It was barely there, some stranger might not even recognize it for what it truly was. But Lucifer knew. He knew if he never saw the sun again, he still wouldn’t be left in the dark. Not ever.

“You do know me best,” Michael told him.

Their eyes met, and the intensity of the burning emeralds caught the smug reply in Lucifer’s throat.

He was still under their spell even when Michael glanced about.

“Where’s everybody?”

Lucifer blinked himself back to consciousness, but just as his heart was about to finally slow back down it suddenly skidded several beats. Truly there was no one around. Neither of them noticed as all five (or more?) people disappeared from the tattoo shop.

“They’re probably hiding in the back,” Lucifer answered half-heartedly.

Maybe he was supposed to check, go round and through the backdoor scare the shit out of his damned colleagues, and most of all his annoying little brother, but this feeling in his guts told him that indeed there were only the two of them left behind. But why?

Why…?

_So that you could finally work up your courage, you fucking idiot._

He was going lightheaded from the heat cruising in his veins.

It had been years. Years and years, sometimes Lucifer would count three decades of _something_ , and why _now_? Why now all of a sudden?

His feverish eyes raked over Michael’s body until it settled on his face; the deep triangular shadow over his eyebrow, the sharp light on his cheekbones and jaw, the gentle yet fervid look as he couldn’t tear his eyes from the star on his perfectly carved chest.

“Hey, Michael,” Lucifer asked, he felt he could fall apart at the seams any time.

Michael blinked up at him.

“Hypothetically, if I let you. Just in theory,” he took a deep breath. “What would you draw on me? As a tattoo.”

For a second he wondered if Michael remembered why he brought this one up all of a sudden. The tiny flickering flame of hope was just about to blink out, but then he caught that glimmer in the other man’s eyes. A bright glimpse of sunlight reflected in the most beautiful precious stone, and Lucifer had to clench his teeth to bar his heart from jumping out of his throat.

Michael took a step. He was now standing right in front of the mirror, and even despite the five inches still separating them the fine hairs stood on end on Lucifer’s arm as if stretching to touch the naked hot skin of the other’s shoulder. He leant closer, and his breath drew mist on the mirror. Then followed a little symbol.

At this angle Lucifer couldn’t see it correctly, but he was already afraid if he moved an inch his knees would give up on him.

There was something uncertain, almost shy in his expression when Michael turned to Lucifer again.

“This,” he said. “I’d draw this on you if you’d have it.”

In the fading moist there was a clumsy heart.

Lucifer’s eyes widened. Not just imperceptibly when he was surprised, but close to the size of saucers he was sure. He froze. Words tumbled on his tongue into a neat knot stifling the firestorm roaring in the pit of his stomach burning all the butterflies to fine colourful ashes.

_Do you mean it? Do you **really** mean it? You must mean it. Please tell me you mean it!_

Michael looked back at him with such raw honesty.

Without further thought, not that he was really capable of that at the moment, Lucifer reached out, cupped Michael’s cheeks in his hands and pulled him onto his mouth for a kiss that was long, _long_ overdue.

At first Michael made a small surprised sound, and Lucifer worried that he would soon have to fight all his selfish desires or be prepared to lose everything, but then he was met with eager hot lips and hot hands burning palm prints on either side of his waist.

Waves of pleasure rolled through him from head to toe, and he was pretty sure he mewled a little, but Michael swallowed down the sound, hungry and eager, as if he had tasted ambrosia for the very first time and could never get enough of it. Oh did Lucifer know the feeling!

When he finally pulled back, Lucifer’s head thudded against the mirror’s cool surface.

Damn, none of them bothered to slip a tongue into the kiss, how could they still look so debauched?

Oh but how couldn’t he feel like he was going to swoon this instant when Michael was still so close, hands on his hips and nose nuzzling his cheek moving to his ear at a languid pace. So sweet and adorable that Lucifer felt inclined to snort and add a malicious jibe, but he couldn’t help it. When he, too, was grinning like he just won the lottery.

“Not bad for a first kiss,” Lucifer eventually mustered. He sounded just as wrecked as he felt. “ _Ouch_. Hey!”

“What?”

“Don’t what me, you just _bit_ me!”

Michael hummed and dipped his head back where it rested in the crook of Lucifer’s neck. He half-apologetically kissed the spot where he just nipped the blond.

“What was that for?” Lucifer only didn’t try to shove Michael away because it was only the other man keeping him upright and standing.

“This,” he kissed the spot again, sucking the skin into his mouth and letting it go with a loud smack. “Is because of your shitty memory.”

“ _No_ way!”

He cocked an eyebrow, and up from so close it looked even more sarcastic, but before Lucifer could go on and demand how there was no way he would forget a kiss he had been dreaming about for damn decades Michael dove back for another slow kiss.

Just when Lucifer gasped at the first swipe of tongue on his lower lip, only the tip touching his teeth the bell over the door rang an outraging happy jingle.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm stopping here because I'm a little b*tch and need to get back to my essay.  
> I don't even know, but maybe 2-3 more parts to come.
> 
> Yet, thank you so very uch for everyone tagging along! Guys, you are precious and mean the world to me!


	15. Chapter 15

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There are certain, rather unfortunate slip ups. And then there are rather pleasant making ups.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hahahaa, look who rather updates than gets some school stuff done?  
> I'm so sorry I haven't updated this in forever! I have like half and half of the next chapters but I can't get myself to finish anything. (This one would have been much longer, but I decided to pick it apart otherwise I would have never gotten around here, sorry!)
> 
> I still haven't gotten myself back together after my BB, so please forgive me for being so below my usual style here!

 

Even though he could feel irritation rippling through the muscles in Michael’s back under his hands Lucifer didn’t let him go from the kiss. Hell, he would be damned if he let go now! So he rather took advantage of the groan and pushed his tongue into the other’s mouth sliding along the back of his teeth until Michael tried to bite down. _Then_ he pulled back.

Michael glared daggers at him, but all Lucifer could do was grin. He would suffer any injury as if it was the brightest gift ever if it meant he got to see the sea green of Michael’s eyes turn the colour of the warm passionate night.

“Oh please don’t bother. Just until I take a photo and Gabriel will owe me a fortune.”

In the doorway Raphael stood, phone in her hand. When Michael directed his glower at her she only looked back as unimpressed as ever.

“Taking pictures without permission is really rude,” Lucifer noted.

“Because you never do that.”

The blond scoffed in indignation. “Sketching and taking photos for blackmail are entirely different.”

“It’s not blackmail. It’s serious business,” Raphael said, flipping her hair over her shoulder. “If you have a problem, talk to your brother about it. Or you could have simply gotten together years ago.”

“We didn’t get together.”

The sentence rang worse in the air than the clap of thunder in the middle of the night.

He cut a quick glance at Michael. His heart stammered to a stop. God Almighty, Michael looked so scared in that blink of the moment. Lucifer just wanted to go back and kiss him. He wanted to kiss away the tightness from his lips, to get the other’s eyes to slide shut instead of looking at him with such disappointment and heartbreak.

“You know what, Raphael?” Before he could spit out how it was none of her business, Michael gently touched his wrist to shut him up.

“Where are the others?” Michael asked without looking at Lucifer.

Raphael’s eyebrow arched by a fracture in irritation. Her jaw clenched.

“I was nominated Messenger instead of Gabriel.”

“What?”

“He planned you a birthday party, Michael. I came to fetch you, and also warn you. We all know how bad you take to being jumped from behind a sofa in a dark room.”

A strange expression of long-suffering endurance and gentle appreciation crossed Michael’s features.

“Fine,” he said. “Just let me freshen up a bit. I can still feel the chair sticking to my back. Bathroom still to the right?” Without waiting for an actual answer Michael already passed round Lucifer.

And okay, wait, why, where was Michael going? How was Lucifer supposed to make his slip up to him if he just disappeared like that? He just wanted to wrap his arms around his new _boyfriend_ \- he _wanted_ to call Michael his boyfriend - and never let go. And that went definitely not only for hugging and snuggling but kissing – hell, Michael was like Heaven to kiss –, and he really wouldn’t mind if the making out turned into bed-rocking sex—

“Keep it in your pants, Satan.”

Like a freezing shower in the summer heat Raphael stepped up to him.

Lucifer still remembered with painstaking accuracy their first meeting six years ago. He received only one glare disguised as a modest nod of a greeting during the whole lunch. He immediately knew Raphael wasn’t going to be pleasant to fool around with. (It naturally didn’t deter him from occasionally drunk-texting, torturing, teasing and complaining about Michal being an ass, but he kept it to a minimum.)

Before Lucifer could retort, Raphael went on.

“Now you have five minutes to kiss and make up.”

Lucifer not so subtly gaped at her.

“If you make him more heartbroken than he already is…”

“You know,” the blond said, finally finding his voice again. “I think Michael can kill me all right on his own.”

“Unfortunately he has a weak spot for you.” She said low and deep-rumbling like the distant thunder. _He’d let you destroy him again and again_ , Lucifer remembered the beginning of yet another one of her terrifying speeches. He wondered if she could ever top it off.

“God bless, you don’t.”

She didn’t even hum. She didn’t need to give sound that the whole Eastern coast could taste her approval. This menacing, silent _damn, right_ he could feel resonating and crackling with electricity in his marrow.

“You’ve got four minutes left.”

 

Lucifer paused before the door, his fist at the ready to knock. His heart was hammering away second after precious second. What was he so worried about? They didn’t even fight this time. ( _Yet._ )

Before he could change his mind, he barged into the room and closed the door behind himself. If he was going to get punched, well, he better got over it sooner than later.

As expected, and really, he should have known better, as soon as the door tore open Michael’s head whipped around, his shoulders squared, hands pulled up in front of him for defence and ready to strike.

When he saw it was only Lucifer he let out a deep breath and visibly slumped against the basin. The water was still rushing from the tap.

Michael pinched the bridge of his nose. “Seriously?” he groaned. “You know I can’t handle an ambush.”

Lucifer scoffed. “It wasn’t an ambush.”

“ _Lucifer_.”

“Okay, fine. Fine. I’m sorry. Sorry, okay?” he said, and crossed that one step separating them. He gently caressed his hand over Michael’s shoulder, his fingertips brushing the white scar of a bullet having gone through him. “Sorry.”

“So many sorries?” Michael asked a bit strained, but he at least let his hand fall to his side. “In advance for a lifetime?”

“No, you idiot. For outside. I didn’t mean it.”

“It’s okay.”

In that one word there was everything that wasn’t _o-kay_ with Lucifer’s life. Michael stepping down, curling a smile that didn’t reach his eyes, and pulling up a marble wall around himself because he, for some blatantly stupid reason, couldn’t have what he wanted. Because whatever Lucifer dictated were acceptable terms until they didn’t have to be apart.

“No, Michael, it’s not.”

It was only a momentary slip, something that had been on Lucifer’s tongue after each kiss for so many years so it slid past his teeth without him noticing.

There was pain in the questioning quirk of the dark eyebrow.

Lucifer took Michael’s face in both of his hands.

“You are such a fucking idiot, Micha, I can’t even bear with you.”

The other tensed up, he could feel the jaw tighten under his palm, but Lucifer only allowed a smile to curl on his lips, and pulled Michael closer.

“I want to hold you. I want to kiss you, and I want to fuck you,” he purred against the brunet’s lips. “Right now I want to kiss you most, but I really, _really_ want to have you. Call you mine. I mean it.”

Up from this close Michael’s blown pupils were black pools with a thin strip of sea around them. Lucifer could feel his skin prickle with warmth and turn pink. He couldn’t help himself but push forward to devour that thought of distance between them. Their lips fitted together just as perfectly as before. Heat pooled in his chest and with a burst spread through his limbs, filling him up with the warmth of summer as Michael wrapped his arms around his waist.

This time it was the tip of the elder’s tongue to probe at the seam of Lucifer’s mouth. Eagerly he opened up and deepened their kiss.

He surged forward, pressing Michael against the basin, his hand slipping into the thick dark locks. All he wanted was to be close, melt together, absorb all the other’s warmth, his scent, the feel of his skin, so that no sneering voice in his head could ever claim that this was all but a dream that he had never had Michael as his—

“Boyfriend,” Lucifer gasped, tearing away from Michael’s hungry mouth. “You are my boyfriend.”

He frowned in confusion, but then a grin, a full teeth-flashing grin spread on his face.

“Damn right. And you are mine.”

Lucifer returned the smile. He felt like he was actually radiating.

Then his eyes slid down to Michael’s chest. It was angry red around the sailboat. Lucifer failed to realize the heat of the irritated skin seeping through his shirt under the furnace that was his boyfriend. _His boyfriend._ He loved the sound of it.

“I should cover it up.”

“How about you kiss me first?”

Lucifer’s gaze lifted to the other’s face.  Before he could word his disbelief and concerns about Michael’s mental state he felt hands carding through his hair and he was pulled back onto desire-tasting hot lips and he all but forgot to protest.

Their knees bumped as they stumbled back, the porcelain edge of the basin pressing into the small of Michael’s back. One of his hands had left their grip in Lucifer’s hair to turn off the tap, but it was quickly back pulling him closer until they could dissolve into each other from thigh to chest.

There were so many things happening all at once. Michael’s fingers massaging his scalp, his tongue eagerly mapping out every inch of his mouth, while the other hand slowly but purposefully made its way under Lucifer’s shirt.

Suddenly a chilling sensation shot through his spine. Unfortunately, it had nothing to do with Michael’s clever mouth. Lucifer froze.

“Did I do something wrong?” Michael asked, but the blond mostly only saw his spit-shined lips moving.

He shook his head, cleared his throat.

“I think our five minutes are over.”

“What kind of five minutes?” Oh, even suspicion sounded sexy on that hoarse tone.

“Our five minutes to kiss and make up.” Michael still didn’t look convinced, so Lucifer pecked him on the lips once more before he took a sobering step back. “Come on, I’ll cover up your tattoo.”

“Raphael?” Michael asked, connecting the dots. His eyes gleamed with mirth. “Are you afraid of Raphael?”

“Right. Who would be afraid of a sociopath?” Lucifer rolled his eyes.

Before he could turn to leave the bathroom and also hopefully forego Michael’s best friend skinning him alive and leaving his carcass to her teething puppy (as she had promised the last time they met) Michael caught hold of his wrist. Under Lucifer’s vibrant gaze he lifted the hand and kissed the knuckles with such naked devotion that effectively turned the blond’s knees into jelly.

“I love you too, Lucifer.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have the feelign that this fic is going to be something like my Green Eyed Monster was for the time I was writing my thesis. So, here I try to pledge that after I pass an exam I'll add a chapter. Let's see if I can be worthy of your patience lovelies!


	16. Chapter 16

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Glitter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This turned out weirdly long. Like really long. Sorry about that, and it doesn't really bring the story closer to an end. You could almost say I'm stalling before the chapter that's reason for the rating. Ugh, I feel so bad, guys, I'm really sorry. I hope you'll find something to like tho! <3

 

Eventually Michael’s skin-tight shirt made it easier to keep the protective foil over his tattoo for the night. Lucifer rattled off the instruction manual for fresh tattoo-owners, warned him, sternly, not to under any circumstances let little Castiel claw at it, and therefore Michael really should avoid sending a picture to the boy in case he got a bit too excited, he really didn’t give a fuck if Michael promised, Lucifer won’t redo this goddamn ship if it doesn’t heal as it’s supposed to!

How it didn’t escalate into a full-blown fight (and most probably angry wall sex) was because Raphael tapped her watch with a glare and practically dragged them out from the parlour. To be fair, it wasn’t much dragging – more like she left the shop and the other two decided that if they wanted to keep their testicles in their rightful places they would better follow.

By the time they reached the road curling along the seashore Michael carefully brushed his fingers against Lucifer’s knuckles. He immediately laced their fingers together and tugged Michael into his side.

It caused them physical pain to let go and somehow stand next to each other without touching when they reached Balthazar’s house.

That was the price they agreed on to allow their friends to raise the bets one last night.

  


“No, I don’t trust you, and no one can blame me.”

“This hurts, Mikey,” Gabriel pressed his palm to his heart. “It truly does.”

Michael’s scowl only deepened.

“I’m not opening it.”

“I haven’t tricked you in forever!”

“Exactly.”

Michael tried to push the box back into Gabriel’s chest, but the younger pulled his hands away as if he was forced to touch some rotting carcass.

“Hell no! It’s bad luck if you don’t open your own present!”

“Then it’ll be a nice box in the closet!”

“Micha-eeel!”

“Just open it already,” Balthazar cut in. “We’ve been waiting for your sweet asses for hours, don’t drag it out any longer. My liver thirsts for some wine.”

Michael cut a disappointed glare at the Brit, but as there was no one to back him up in this windmill fight he turned his frown at the pretty purple box in his hands. He took a deep breath - from the nervous bob of his throat anyone would expect him to lift the package to his ear to check if it was ticking. Then, surrounded by the tense silence of the room he pulled the ribbon loose.

Just as he opened the lid—

Michael disappeared in a glimmering, shimmering cloud of glitter.

“WHAT—?”

“THE FUCK!”

“OH MY GOD!”

Someone howled with laughter.

Another one, Anna, who stood way too close to Michael, choked on a mouthful of glitter.

“You fucking moron!” was Lucifer’s reaction. He stomped up to Gabriel and smacked him on the top of his head.

“Why-y?!” the younger sputtered in indignation, his laughter smothered into hiccups.

“You know that I just put a tattoo on his chest!”

“Well. Let’s hope you sealed the foil right.”

While the sharp, murderous glint in Lucifer’s ice blue eyes was one of the most terrifying sights, it came nothing close to the low, almost gentle tone of Michael’s voice as he called out Gabriel’s name. The serene smile under the raining glimmer at each blink made the sight all the more frightening.

“Come here, little brother,” Michael said.

“No…!” Gabriel squeaked in true horror.

Michael inclined his head. From his hair, brows and eyelashes glitter filtered to the ground and his shirt. “I said, come here.”

“Fuck no!”

By now Gabriel should have known better than to even attempt to outrun Michael twice the same day, especially when he wasn’t strapped to a dissecting table.

The younger barely made his way from behind the couch in hopes ofan escape through the kitchen when Michael was already there. He caught Gabriel by the arm, spun the smaller man around and gave him a smothering hug, even going so far to pick him up and bury his head in the crook of his neck - mindful to rub off as much glitter on his little brother as he could.

Initially Gabriel kicked and whined and screamed, but after he realized there was no way out from Michael’s iron hold he gave up and took his punishment like a kicked puppy.

Later on Gabriel would be a bit troubled about whether his present was a design of pure genius, or if it was a total disaster as his skin itched from the glitter for the entire next week.

However, the moment Raphael sent him a short vine of the glitter bomb going off in Michael’s face made him forget all his misery.

 

“I really, really don’t want to touch you,” Lucifer said eying Michael from a safe distance.

“Frankly I don’t want to touch myself either,” the brunet answered his mouth pulled to an irritated line. He sighed, and then promptly choked on the thin cloud of glitter. “Damn it.”

“Let’s take some damage control.”

“Bathroom’s taken,” Michael noted. He leaned forward, and cautiously tried to shake some of the insufferably sticky glimmer dust out of his hair. It all stuck to his palm now. “Anna’s trying to rinse out her windpipe.”

Lucifer shrugged. “I was planning to plunder our host’s closet. We might find a T-shirt that fits you. Come on.”

“I don’t think Balthazar would appreciate me leaving a trail of glitter to his bedroom.”

“He’d deserve if I fucked you on his bed from behind.”

Michael made some indignant noise at the back of his throat.

“It was Gabriel’s spiel.”

“And this Brit Casanova is friends with him. It’s a reason good enough for me. Come on. I also need to check your tattoo.”

When they left the living room the short hairs prickled at the back of Lucifer’s neck. Their friends weren’t really subtle about their staring as he led the way pulling his new (secret) boyfriend by the wrist.

“Where do you think you’re going?”

“Leave it, Balthy. What time is it?”

“Still the 29th.”

“That means I’m winning.”

“But not where I bloody sleep!”

“No, that’s at least 30% my win now…”

“We really could just tell them,” Michael suggested softly.

Lucifer looked back at him over his shoulder, his hand on the doorknob to the bedroom. “We agreed we won’t for today.”

Michael pouted. Lucifer couldn’t call it by any other name, the lower lip sticking out a bit and the slight hurt look in his eyes was a dictionary example of a moderate pout. If it wasn’t for the layer of purple-gold shine he would have been happy to kiss it away.

Instead he lifted his hand, and with his thumb stroked the edge of Michael’s mouth.

“Having second thoughts?” he teased.

The very tip of the other’s tongue brushed against the pad of his finger. Lucifer pulled it back with a wide grin.

“Just – if he wants to play some stupid game again, you better team up with me against Gabriel,” Michael said.

“Of course,” Lucifer agreed as he pulled Balthazar’s bedroom door open. “But I also need to blackmail him into doing me another tattoo.”

Michael’s eyes narrowed. “Don’t you have enough already?”

Lucifer chuckled with no malice in the deep rolling sound. In spite of himself he could feel his features melting into something soft and adorning as he held the other’s sea-green gaze.

“There’s one that I certainly miss.” Then he extended his other hand and touched a relatively clean patch on Michael’s hip to usher him inside the room. “Lemme see if I have to drown Gabe in glitter first.”

 

When they returned to the main room most of the mess had been cleaned up.

Both of them were a bit flustered. The usual teasing banter that had gone down between them wouldn’t have been that bad in any other setting - and it wasn’t even how Michael spent most of the past ten minutes shirtless and just so appealingly irritated and sexy as he complained how easily Lucifer found his way in Balthazar’s enormous closet, no. The main problem was the throbbing, pulsating hot memory of that kiss back in the shop, first, second, and third, and the outraging frustration that they trapped themselves into a gutter of irresolvable sexual tension.

Also Michael was a little bitch. Acting high and mighty as if he wasn’t affected at all. Lucifer wondered for a moment if he didn’t want to add another rose onto his neck maybe they could have stolen a few minutes of making out…

But his train of thoughts were quickly halted as Michael sauntered into the kitchen. And no. Okay, no, that really wasn’t his usual way of walking with killer intent. He filled a pitcher from the tap.

“You’re ogling,” came a low sneer from his side.

Lucifer’s gaze flashed at Meg. “So are you.”

She shrugged. Her gaze remained trained on Michael’s perfectly shaped backside.

“I wasn’t judging.”

The corner of Lucifer’s mouth curled up into a wry smirk. If it had been anyone else but Meg…

“So, I’m just being casual, and it’s not like my next salary is depending on it…” She suggestively trailed off.

“Do you see any glitter on me?!”

“Well. There’s some in your hair…and on your hand.”

Whatever she might have said next was lost on Lucifer.

Michael trotted past them out of the house onto the porch and right in front of everyone’s eyes, in his way too tight jeans, leaned over the railing and dunked the pitcher over his head, trying to rinse out the remaining glitter from his hair.

Lucifer was so close to just ripping those pants off his hips, and then and there fuck his sinfully delicious ass. Because this? This teasing neither his heart nor his restrained cock could take.

 

After his makeshift shower Michael refused to open any more of his presents. He thanked the last two packages from Bartholomew and Anna, glared at Lucifer as he claimed he wouldn’t get anything (just as promised), accepted a kiss to the cheek from Raphael, and that was it about celebrating his birthday.

That made Gabriel terribly crestfallen. He would have whined more if he hadn’t forgotten to read the shadows on Michael’s face as expertly as his brother did, but either way he became quickly more excited when he fished out board game for the next two hours from underneath the coffee table.

Playing Bang! was just the most ideal Western-themed board/card game for a bunch of psychos and sociopaths. Especially as every lost life and occasionally even deflated shot meant another swig of alcohol to loosen tongues and screw up fine motor skills. Soon Ruby was sprawled over Anna’s thighs while loudly chanting how she wants a showdown with Gabriel, even though just a minute ago she declared herself to be Deputy and thus should have devoted her cards to protect Gabriel - who for the first time in forever happened to become Sheriff of the team.

Lucifer was down to one bullet of lives, even though he had already crawled back into the game after he shot out Crowley.

He focused his gaze over at Michael in the middle of a duel with Meg throwing Bang after Bang on top of the pile of cards in the middle of the table. The brunet’s cheeks were flushes, his eyes bright as he threw in his very last card and watched with a triumphant grin as Meg threw herself back against Raphael and kicked Bartholomew in the side.   

A bomb of noise went off and it nearly made him jump out of his ink-soaked skin.

“Anna’s gonna die!” Gabriel sing-sang, happy with his four lives despite Michael and Lucifer’s best efforts combined. (That was a good indication to know that Michael was one of the Bandits, because revenge or not if he was a Deputy he would have done his job with suicidal efficiency. As a Sheriff he would simply get alcohol poisoning sooner than going down in the game.)

“Who’s going to watch your hide, then?!” Anna shot back flustered.

“I’d volunteer,” Crowley piped back into the game from the side.

“Anna wants to tap Gabe’s ass!”

“Wait until Kali finds out.”

“She’d just hand him over. Happily.”

“Card, Anna, draw a card!”

Anna, face as red as her hair, did just that, then with a great sigh of relief flicked the dynamite card over to Raphael.

Michael leaned over to Lucifer, his head almost resting on the blond’s shoulder. His eyes were lingering on the card displaying Lucifer’s lives.

“I haven’t put a bullet through you yet,” he noted regretfully.

“The temptation, huh?” Lucifer smirked.

“It’s devouring me,” Michael breathed, just before he pulled back to draw a diamond and pass the dynamite to Lucifer.

Then he drew one more. For a long second he inspected it, a deviously calm expression spreading on his face. His eyes flashed over at his boyfriend.

Lucifer’s eyes narrowed. “You wouldn’t dare,” he hissed.

Michael grinned. He pointed his index and middle fingers at Lucifer, and with a flick of his hand threw his card at him.

“Bang. Lucifer.”

Lucifer threw down all his useless cards that just wouldn’t help him stay in the game long enough to know if the dynamite would blow up in his face or not. A hurricane of laughter and taunting cheers enveloped their gathering as he revealed that the Renegade was out.

“Fuck you all,” he snarled. He was a sore loser, so what? “Especially you!”

Michael, the asshole only laughed a rough sound.

When, nursing his hurt pride, Lucifer wanted to slip out of the stuffy room, suddenly a hand reached out, grabbed the front of his shirt and pulled at him. There was the quick, terrifyingly  heady sensation of falling. Just in time Lucifer managed to catch hold of the armrest and back of the chair Michael took as his throne for the night. The elder’s hot breath scorched his ear. Lucifer shuddered.

In the background there was a collective gasp. Someone squealed.

But Michael didn’t bring him down for a kiss. He just kept the blond close, so close it was already the most intimate of touching.

Just before he let go, Michael whispered, softer than the lightest summer breeze. Lucifer felt more the lips forming the words of I love you than hear them.

“Wait for me outside?” Michael suggested, when there were several inches distance between their faces. “I need some fresh air.”

“You’ve gotta die first,” Lucifer countered as he straightened. He looked back at their group of friends over his shoulder. “A tattoo for killing this asshole!” he offered to the definitely disappointed looking bunch. Then he headed for the porch in the hopes of a peaceful smoke.

 

He barely burnt down half of his cigarette when he felt someone standing inappropriately close to him.

“Who killed you?” he asked, leaning back against Michael’s shins.

“The dynamite.”

“What? You always survive that...Hey!”

Michael had just stolen his cigarette and flicked it over. The stud flew, a tiny red shooting star. Then it landed on the sand and blinked out of existence.

“It was so uncalled for.”

“I won’t kiss you if your mouth tastes like death.”

“Alcohol’s a good disinfectant,” he grumbled.

“Whatever you say,” Michael agreed softly.

He took a seat next to Lucifer. In silence they listened to the sound of traffic and the rolling waves mixed with the noise as the game went on inside. Balthazar was fighting for his life. Gabriel accidentally killed one of his Deputies. It was a loud game. Especially when they opened the windows to let some sobering fresh air inside.

It could have been the perfect, sappiest opportunity to start making out.

Michael was warm only a breath away from his cool side, the fine hairs on his arms standing on end, desperate to touch. They could melt together nicely. Lucifer felt desire rouse a bunch of butterflies in his stomach. A pleasant buzz filled his insides. It wasn’t the alcohol, he was sure.

It could have been such a perfect moment...

However, there was one question stirring hot and insistent in his mind.

“Okay,” Lucifer leaned even closer to Michael. “So, when did I actually kiss you and why don’t I remember it?”

Michael regarded him with a half serious half mocking look. He made some helpless motion with his hands before he just entwined them and let them drop in his lap with asoft grunt.

“Milwaukee, what, five years ago?”

“It’s sometimes scary how you remember everything like that.” Lucifer smirked, but when Michael only quirked an absolutely unimpressed eyebrow in reply he rolled his eyes. “Yeah, I was there I guess. Late April, right? You dropped by for a weekend.”

Michael nodded.

“But I still don’t remember kissing you!”

“I got there late. I hated your friends, your friends hated me. After an hour sulking and freezing my ass off on the beach, all of a sudden you trot down, trip over me and the next thing I know we’re making out.”

Lucifer made a sound that could be best described as a choked-on squeak. Neither really realized when the blond’s hand had found its way to squeeze Michael’s thigh in surprise.

“Only to find that by the time I took a breath you were out cold on the wet sand.”

“You’re making this up!”

“And next morning you had absolutely no idea what happened.”

Lucifer tried to imagine that morning after – especially that he might have had some vague recollection of that.

He remembered the awkward scraping feeling of something weird that had nothing to do with his hangover and the desert in his mouth. There was Michael’s arm slung over his waist its weight different, possessive in a way it had never been, his breath and lips on Lucifer’s neck, brushing kisses involuntarily on the red roses every now and then. The way the elder stirred behind him had foggy panic of this weirdness cloud his mind, and in a hurry Lucifer scrambled out of bed, dragging half of the sheets along with him and for a good hour locked himself up in the bathroom. He had claimed it was the worst of his hangovers ever.

“Oooh.” He groaned clamping a hand over his eyes. “That finally explains why you started going all Ice Queen on me.”

They shared a hum, a soft silent laughter at their ridiculously awful communication skills. They could have been making out and having sex for at least five goddamn years! But because both of them were drunk just enough not to want to start a fight about why Lucifer didn’t question Michael’s new romantically intimate snuggling habits, or why Michael didn’t blow up on Lucifer locking himself up in the bathroom for no reason the blond quickly moved onto the second most compelling issue.

“Hey, next question though. Cas… how will he take to the two of us? Because you do want him to know about the two of us, right?”

“He likes you, Lucifer.”

“That’s not what I asked! It’d be really awkward if we started to compete for your favours. For the little brat. I’d obviously win. I don’t wanna play the evil step-dad, or whatever my role would be in your little family… Why are you smiling?”

“It’s adorable how flustered you are.”

“These are valid questions!” Lucifer protested. So now they were even calling each other adorable?! It didn’t make it any more acceptable though.

“Castiel is totally fine with it. As I said, he likes you.”

“He was pissed that I was ‘sleeping in his place’ the last time I was over.”

“Before I came here do you know what he asked me? And here I quote,” Michael cleared his throat as if he was preparing for some serious speech. “When Luce comes over next, will you two marry?”

Lucifer gaped at him. Michael had to click his jaw shut. There was mirth in the depth of his gaze and glowing under his skin, and little flames on his fingertips as he rubbed small, centered circles on Lucifer’s stubble-covered chin.

“He declared that he was going to marry Dean, but then Dean told him that it’s a no-go, because they should kiss first. But then Mary, as the best consultant on the matters of marriage, told them that they should be dating first. And it’s only nice after the third date to kiss.”

“How do we come into all this?” Kids were weird. Well, it wasn’t like Lucifer didn’t want to marry Michael when he was four, but people tended to forget such minor details as adults.

“We come into this as Castiel started counting, and since you were over two times, now my visit is the third. He counts them as dates. And so he thought we were obviously going to kiss now. And since that exhausts dating in his books, on the fourth ‘date’ we are supposed to get married.”

“Wow.”

“Yeah.”

“So it was actually your kid pressuring you into asking me out?”

“...No.”

“Jesus Christ, I need a drink. And a smoke.” Lucifer pushed himself up on his feet. “Fuck it, I need that half bottle of vodka I saw inside.”

“I think Meg is already at it.”

“Wait,” his eyes narrowed as he looked down at Michael. “You won’t give me a speech about drinking and smoking and all your usual high and mighty healthy crap?”

Michael shrugged.

“It’s not like I won’t drink a quarter of that. Just keep in mind that I have some plans for the night.”

“What plans?”

The sharp curl of the brunet’s lips made desire bloom in Lucifer’s chest.

“I’m sure you have a really good guess.”

 

In the end they didn’t get any dizzier than they already were. In fact, it was quite the opposite.

Just as Michael had predicted Meg had seized the bottle of vodka, and by the time they returned to the living room their friends were at another round of Bang. They wanted to give Michael and Lucifer some extra time to finally stick their tongues down the other’s throat - or that’s what they claimed.

In the meantime it left Lucifer reclining in Michael’s seat while the brunet rested his crossed forearms on the backrest and his chin on top of them only a wide inch from Lucifer’s mouth. In a hushed tone that only the elder could understand he tried to talk Michael into rather sitting on his lap. The dreamy soft smile and the gentle snark he got as an equally silent answer soothed the impact of the blow to his sensitive ego. It was still easier to charm the stars to the bottom of the sea than convince Michael that their friends would take it as the both of them being too drunk to keep their unhealthy platonic affections at bay. He pretty much had convinced himself about this.

 

At some point Raphael pointedly kicked Gabriel in the shin under the table. It was a not so subtle sign that he had forgotten something. When he started his impossibly loud and indignant whining Raphael just glared at him and with her chin inclined in the direction of Michael and Lucifer, now practically breathing the same air without touching.

The sight was disturbingly intimate that would just make anyone want to turn away and leave the room altogether.

Not Gabriel, of course.

“OhmyGod, could you two just go to bed already?” he exclaimed. However, it only earned him another kick to his already aching shin. “What?” But she only glared some more. “I’m too drunk for this Raph, your glares look all the same!”

“Not my problem.”

“It’s a you forgot something very important kind of glare, Gabe,” Michael suggested from across the room.

Gabriel pondered on how he could even hear his voice--

“Oh!” he jumped up, and promptly almost fell over Meg’s outstretched leg. “I forgot! Cake. Cake!” He grabbed at the brunette to his right, first only to steady himself, but then he didn’t let her go and dragged her into the kitchen.

It was a miracle how there was no eventual need to call the firemen - as it turned out in fleeting ten minutes Gabriel walked back with a Black Forest cake that was practically on fire from all the 36 candles happily burning on top.

“You know, it’s technically my birthday now,” Lucifer smirked his cruel little smile.

“Shut up, Lucy,” Gabriel grunted. As he plopped down on his brother’s lap the gleeful yellow flames, now on the coffeetable,  wavered. “We all know you hate cakes.”

“Because I never got one,” the blond huffed.

Just to pacify Gabriel he placed his chin on his shoulder. He would better make himself comfortable. Putting out all those candles won’t be easy. Nor quick.

He wasn’t wrong. The next few minutes was spent with loud complaints as Michael - instead of closing his eyes, making a wish and then blowing out the candles - just licked his thumb and forefinger and methodically set to pinching off the little flames. He wouldn’t risk being laughed at if the candles happened to flicker back to life.

“Party pooper!”

“You won’t get a wish this way!”

“I have nothing to wish for,” Michael answered calmly as he moved on to candle #18.

Lucifer hid his smile against Gabriel’s shoulder.

 

 

 

“So…” Balthazar purred empathically. He slid so close to Raphael, their thighs were only a hair’s width away from touching.

“So what?” she asked back and brushed the Brit’s hand off her shoulder.

“Don’t play the clueless, darling.”

“Yeah, we know you know.” Gabriel added. He tried his best not to bounce in his seat.  He failed horribly.

Having so many curious faces so close should have made anyone at least slightly anxious, but Raphael had always been the exception when it came to getting affected by the sight of a bunch of adults who looked just like Michael’s kid a day before Christmas.

“I know a lot of things,” Raphael retorted. “Like how Kali will put you through a diet if you really finish the rest of the cake all by yourself.”

“What Gabriel wants to know,” Meg cut in smoothly, “is if he should get a mortgage on his flat to pay his debts.”

“I don’t!”

“Come on, it’s pretty sure they are going to fuck, and everyone agrees on that,” said Crowley.

As it turned out there wasn’t an actual consensus about that statement.

Not even Michael sliding his hand into Lucifer’s back pocket and quite suspiciously, if they were to judge by the jerk in the blond’s steps, also groping his ass was enough proof that they would actually get to fucking each other. However, nine out of ten agreed that there was going to be some action tonight. Bartholomew was impossible to convince. (Ruby pondered on joining his statement just to go against Gabriel on this one too, but eventually she changed her mind. The fact that Raphael moderately dropped her vote on the horizontal tango meant a lot.)

“But more seriously,” Meg crooned. “Who’s gonna top?”

7:1 claimed that Michael would top (so far Meg being the only one voting for Lucifer). Gabriel started a tirade about how he really doesn’t want to think about such details, because they were his brothers for fuck’s sake, but all that was squelched as he got reminded he was the one to always force bets about said brothers hypothetically doing the do. Eventually he cast his vote on Michael as well.

Again, everyone turned to Raphael who was silently sipping at her martini, now with Balthazar’s arm around her shoulder.

“I voted.”

“No you didn’t!”

“We didn’t hear it!”

In the cacophony before the tipsy bunch of tattooed children started to thump on the table demanding her opinion Raphael took another sip of her drink - that successfully barred Balthazar from nudging her in the side.

She crossed her arms over her chest.

“Lucifer tops,” she stated.

In two words she provided the topic of debate for the rest of the night.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Votes? ;)
> 
> And on a second note: that game I wrote about just hit me, because that's what we're always playing with my friends, and it's hilarious and it really brings out the sociopath from you. I can vouche for that. Trust me. >:D


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